There seems to be a belief that such an exam would produce uniformly high caliber practitioners. There are plenty of lousy members of every regulated profession

There seems to be a belief that such an exam would produce uniformly high caliber practitioners. There are plenty of lousy members of every regulated profession. The exams in regulated professions are designed to test that you know the jargon and general knowledge of the field (anatomy and physiology, case law, etc,). The day-to-day application of that knowledge is usually consistent with that knowledge. Outstanding members of the field are determined by years of experience and specialization. Software doesn't meet any of those expectations. The jargon changes weekly and your expertise with O notation and hash tables means almost nothing in day-to-day practice. The fixation on evaluating candidates on those topics is more about what's handy as a way to narrow the hiring funnel than it is about measuring what's important. Software development is a creative activity. You can't measure that. Safety critical software is developed under regulatory guidelines enforced by process requirements and certification of organizations that follow those processes.