This article seems a bit backward. The low number of people who stay in programming is not entirely the result of people being forced out. A significant number

This article seems a bit backward. The low number of people who stay in programming is not entirely the result of people being forced out. A significant number of programmers never meant to stay programmers forever anyway. Even early in my career, long ago, it was easy to spot people whose long term plan was clearly to move into the executive suite, or VC, or HR, or sales/marketing. Saying "I used to be a programmer myself" to them was a way to establish trust/credibility from those other positions, so they were in it just long enough for it not to be a total lie. Those people already had a plan B. They weren't victims who had to scramble for alternatives, but they still contributed to those statistics. As far as I can tell, the vast majority of people who want to stay programmers are able to do so as long as they keep their skills updated.