4 ms·

I hear quite a few of them are picking up coding.

• kamaal 8y ago
  Doesn't work for almost everybody. You are under estimating how hard it can be for people from non-STEM areas or even inclination to jump to something like programming. Sure every once in a while some one will, but most can't. My company routinely runs coding classes and bootcamps to help people from marketing, advertising, accounting, payroll etc to transition to a software career. Mostly women attend. I don't know of one single person who was able to make the shift. It's hard to do a 40 hour work week(Most have to put in more than that). Then learn something totally obtuse to what you've been doing all life. And most people get into non-STEM professions, because they don't like STEM much. You have to overcome biases, mental inertia and mental training worth decades, this is after your regular work. And there is an endless stack of books and reading resources to get to doing something decent. All the while you have a full time job, commute, family and other commitments. Most of them quit because they know they have to level down a mountain, and it still wont be worth it, because you will never catch up with the main stream ever. You need to be motivated and need to work beyond belief to break through. It's not that people are stupid. But it's really like equivalent of a life long couch potato waking up one day and wanting to run the Bad water ultramarathon. There is simply too much of a gap to make up. These days swim lanes get set early in life. Note there is another story on HN going on about a 64 year old man reading a semester worth books and still unable to land a job(https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19022000 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19022000).