Well, the cultural chauvinists elsewhere in this discussion are certainly in for a rude awakening but I don't know how much pain American programmers will feel.

Well, the cultural chauvinists elsewhere in this discussion are certainly in for a rude awakening but I don't know how much pain American programmers will feel. We have a lot of really first-rate engineers and product people, and we won't stop making our own breakthroughs just because new countries are emerging in the global tech scene. And, in the medium term at least, we have the inertia of several trillion dollars worth of tech behemoths having strong ties to the US. Also, this isn't a zero-sum game; American tech companies generally don't have great penetration in markets like China and India with home-grown competitors, and those competitors generally don't have notable penetration outside of their home markets. There's plenty of growth to be realized without anyone being in a world of hurt.