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Firstly, if you disagree, that's fine. But saying my arguments are "entitled whining" isn't disagreement, it's name calling. DH0, to use Paul Graham's phrase.

Firstly, if you disagree, that's fine. But saying my arguments are "entitled whining" isn't disagreement, it's name calling. DH0, to use Paul Graham's phrase. Secondly, some of my arguments might be wrong, but I provide numbers and evidence to back them up. "Likewise, programmers who define their goals economically (which broadly includes creating value for users) have nearly unparalleled earning potential." Evidence? If you're talking about startups, I already covered that. Read the post. "and incidentally, American programmers are paid better than in almost any other country." This is sophistry. American Xs are paid better than non-American Xs because America has a high GDP per capita, pretty much regardless of X. "First, computer programmers are certainly among the most respected trades." Citation? And, adjusted for IQ, skill, hours worked, degrees earned, and so on? "If it's not, enjoy the fact that you're in a trade where even untrained, mediocre practitioners reach the top 10% of American incomes." Citation? Do you even know what the top 10% is? Here's a hint: The average salary of a computer programmer in the US is $75,000 (cite: http://www.collegeboard.com/csearch/majors_careers/profiles/careers/106478.html http://www.collegeboard.com/csearch/majors_careers/profiles/...). Most of those have college degrees in computer science or other technical fields, they certainly aren't "untrained". And 90th percentile income is higher than that even including people who don't have jobs (cite: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_S...).

ericd 15y ago
Many of the top programmers at Google are making much more than you mentioned in your post. The amount you mentioned is more in line with a ~20 something there, in total compensation. A Bachelors degree does not compare to medical school + residency (they also have to get a bachelor's before starting those two). While you're making money for 8 years at a comfortable 9-6, they're spending over 100k to train themselves and performing physically and mentally exhausting work. Also, in the medical profession, those in primary care don't make the huge amounts you posted - many are below 200k, some far below. It's the specialists that you're thinking of.
- bglbrg 15y ago
  Yeah, I don't have any stats at hand but docs-in-training I know seem to see themselves as being somewhere around $200k in hock for all the training. And med. reimbursement is going to a scary place in the US. I worked in a medical practice and the dual specialist MD lost money on every patient due to insurance and overhead and abysmal medicare reimbursement. Clinical trials provided the practice's profit. Programming / engineering seems much more free.
- iqster 15y ago
  Also don't forget debt. Most MDs and DDSs I know in the US have 350K+ of debt. On top of that, they have to worry about malpractice suits. The work is very demanding physically and emotionally. While I can work from home on a rainy day, a doctor can't.
wheels 15y ago
But saying my arguments are "entitled whining" isn't disagreement, it's name calling. Actually it's not. Name calling would be if I called you an entitled whiner. There's a difference between attacking your argument and attacking you. (And if we're sticking to the taxonomy, that part of my comment would be DH2, "responding to tone".) Evidence? That was the crux of my post. Programmers do get filthy rich (usually via starting tech companies). You're right that at that point they're not programming, but that's because programming in isolation has limited economic value. Using the skills one acquires as a programmer and aiming them at value creation has created a large chunk of America's billionaires. And while that phenomenon is not unique to programming in the least -- in fact, it holds across almost any skilled trade (i.e. soft-skills begin to dominate hard-skills) -- the upper bound is demonstrably higher for programming (as evidenced by the list of richest Americans) than it is for almost any field. American Xs are paid better than non-American Xs because America has a high GDP per capita No, I meant relative to GDP per capita. I live in Germany where programmer salaries are about 50% above the GDP per capita, whereas in the US it's about 75%. From what I've gathered, in the UK, it's closer to 25%. Citation? It's nigh on impossible to measure "respect" in some sort of meaningful way, but here's a list from a couple seconds of Googling on the "Best Jobs in America": http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2010/full_list/index.html http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2010/full_l... 1: Software Architect 7: Database Administrator 18: Software Engineering / Development Director 20: Information Technology Manager 21: Telecommunications Network Engineer 24: Network Operations Project Manager 26: Information Technology Business Analyst 30: Test Software Development Engineer 31: Information Technology Network Engineer 33: Information Technology Program Manager 38: Applications Engineer Your citation for the average programmer salary is from 2005. Salaries have gone up significantly since then. Even just adjusting for inflation (and ignoring the recent IT boom) puts it above the 10% ($82,500) bar. I have no idea what percentage of programmers hold computer science degrees, but it's certainly not "all" and I wouldn't be surprised if it's not "most". One of the things that's somewhat endemic to your case is shifting back and forth between comparing the median with the top tier. Average doctors, bankers and lawyers aren't making the salaries you suggested. Median programmers aren't particularly impressive. Let's split it out: Elite programmers do things like start software companies, work at corporate research labs, work in financial engineering or work on high-profile open source projects. Those folks command respect and have high earning potential. (Though interestingly, among the elite of these groups, programmers probably have the lowest percentage of completed formal training.) Elite investment bankers are measured heavily on their returns and a large portion of their compensation is bonuses. Elite lawyers are measured on their returns (wins) and compensated to a significant extent relative to their non-legal social skills (i.e. their network). Median programmers write intellectually trivial code that solves uninteresting problems. Training is optional and there are virtually no systematic hurdles to cross to enter the trade. They still make relatively high salaries relative to societal norms. Median lawyers work on intellectually trivial cases. Formal training and certification is required and compensation is relatively high, but nothing that will generate notable wealth. Median investment bankers (my father would have been in said category) mostly convince a handful of clients they've been given by their organization to invest in a 90% cookie cutter portfolio and are compensated reasonably well -- varying largely on their ability to source their own clients. (But first year run of the mill stock brokers probably make less than first year run of the mill programmers.) Formal training is theoretically optional (though there's a de facto requirement of a degree in something) and formal certification is required. Again, no notable wealth is generated in this category. At the low end, the gap isn't particularly wide between these groups. At the high end, folks from finance and programming backgrounds comprise a disproportionately large percentage of the economic ultra-elite and lawyers of the political ultra-elite. It still bewilders me that given that demonstrable fact, that you'd brand our profession as not getting any respect.
kristiandupont 15y ago
"Entitled whining" is a bit harsh I agree, but I have to say that my reaction was along those lines as well. What do you suggest be done about the situation? The abstract "respect" term is not very useful. The investment bankers that you mention make a lot of money but they don't have a lot of respect right now, at least for some definition of the word. You could say that we deserve higher salaries but in my opinion the free market works perfectly there. And in fact, the same applies to respect. It's not something you can force, people respect those who earn their respect. It's not adjusted for IQ, skills, worked hours etc.

ericd 15y ago

Many of the top programmers at Google are making much more than you mentioned in your post. The amount you mentioned is more in line with a ~20 something there, in total compensation. A Bachelors degree does not compare to medical school + residency (they also have to get a bachelor's before starting those two). While you're making money for 8 years at a comfortable 9-6, they're spending over 100k to train themselves and performing physically and mentally exhausting work. Also, in the medical profession, those in primary care don't make the huge amounts you posted - many are below 200k, some far below. It's the specialists that you're thinking of.

bglbrg 15y ago
Yeah, I don't have any stats at hand but docs-in-training I know seem to see themselves as being somewhere around $200k in hock for all the training. And med. reimbursement is going to a scary place in the US. I worked in a medical practice and the dual specialist MD lost money on every patient due to insurance and overhead and abysmal medicare reimbursement. Clinical trials provided the practice's profit. Programming / engineering seems much more free.
iqster 15y ago
Also don't forget debt. Most MDs and DDSs I know in the US have 350K+ of debt. On top of that, they have to worry about malpractice suits. The work is very demanding physically and emotionally. While I can work from home on a rainy day, a doctor can't.

wheels 15y ago

But saying my arguments are "entitled whining" isn't disagreement, it's name calling. Actually it's not. Name calling would be if I called you an entitled whiner. There's a difference between attacking your argument and attacking you. (And if we're sticking to the taxonomy, that part of my comment would be DH2, "responding to tone".) Evidence? That was the crux of my post. Programmers do get filthy rich (usually via starting tech companies). You're right that at that point they're not programming, but that's because programming in isolation has limited economic value. Using the skills one acquires as a programmer and aiming them at value creation has created a large chunk of America's billionaires. And while that phenomenon is not unique to programming in the least -- in fact, it holds across almost any skilled trade (i.e. soft-skills begin to dominate hard-skills) -- the upper bound is demonstrably higher for programming (as evidenced by the list of richest Americans) than it is for almost any field. American Xs are paid better than non-American Xs because America has a high GDP per capita No, I meant relative to GDP per capita. I live in Germany where programmer salaries are about 50% above the GDP per capita, whereas in the US it's about 75%. From what I've gathered, in the UK, it's closer to 25%. Citation? It's nigh on impossible to measure "respect" in some sort of meaningful way, but here's a list from a couple seconds of Googling on the "Best Jobs in America": http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2010/full_list/index.html http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2010/full_l... 1: Software Architect 7: Database Administrator 18: Software Engineering / Development Director 20: Information Technology Manager 21: Telecommunications Network Engineer 24: Network Operations Project Manager 26: Information Technology Business Analyst 30: Test Software Development Engineer 31: Information Technology Network Engineer 33: Information Technology Program Manager 38: Applications Engineer Your citation for the average programmer salary is from 2005. Salaries have gone up significantly since then. Even just adjusting for inflation (and ignoring the recent IT boom) puts it above the 10% ($82,500) bar. I have no idea what percentage of programmers hold computer science degrees, but it's certainly not "all" and I wouldn't be surprised if it's not "most". One of the things that's somewhat endemic to your case is shifting back and forth between comparing the median with the top tier. Average doctors, bankers and lawyers aren't making the salaries you suggested. Median programmers aren't particularly impressive. Let's split it out: Elite programmers do things like start software companies, work at corporate research labs, work in financial engineering or work on high-profile open source projects. Those folks command respect and have high earning potential. (Though interestingly, among the elite of these groups, programmers probably have the lowest percentage of completed formal training.) Elite investment bankers are measured heavily on their returns and a large portion of their compensation is bonuses. Elite lawyers are measured on their returns (wins) and compensated to a significant extent relative to their non-legal social skills (i.e. their network). Median programmers write intellectually trivial code that solves uninteresting problems. Training is optional and there are virtually no systematic hurdles to cross to enter the trade. They still make relatively high salaries relative to societal norms. Median lawyers work on intellectually trivial cases. Formal training and certification is required and compensation is relatively high, but nothing that will generate notable wealth. Median investment bankers (my father would have been in said category) mostly convince a handful of clients they've been given by their organization to invest in a 90% cookie cutter portfolio and are compensated reasonably well -- varying largely on their ability to source their own clients. (But first year run of the mill stock brokers probably make less than first year run of the mill programmers.) Formal training is theoretically optional (though there's a de facto requirement of a degree in something) and formal certification is required. Again, no notable wealth is generated in this category. At the low end, the gap isn't particularly wide between these groups. At the high end, folks from finance and programming backgrounds comprise a disproportionately large percentage of the economic ultra-elite and lawyers of the political ultra-elite. It still bewilders me that given that demonstrable fact, that you'd brand our profession as not getting any respect.

kristiandupont 15y ago

"Entitled whining" is a bit harsh I agree, but I have to say that my reaction was along those lines as well. What do you suggest be done about the situation? The abstract "respect" term is not very useful. The investment bankers that you mention make a lot of money but they don't have a lot of respect right now, at least for some definition of the word. You could say that we deserve higher salaries but in my opinion the free market works perfectly there. And in fact, the same applies to respect. It's not something you can force, people respect those who earn their respect. It's not adjusted for IQ, skills, worked hours etc.