At a lot of workplaces (mostly old-line industrial companies), programmers are the bottleneck because there aren't enough of them. This can lead to feelings of

At a lot of workplaces (mostly old-line industrial companies), programmers are the bottleneck because there aren't enough of them. This can lead to feelings of being used because seemingly everyone needs you to do something for them. This can trigger a generally sour outlook. I don't think there's a solution for the first problem, but you can change your outlook and see the constant work as job and career security. Also it's good to remember that the people with lots of downtime or makework at their job aren't necessarily shirking; they just don't have the tools to move forward without you.