Some of the mentioned professions, law, accounting, medicine, legally require a degree, a minimum number of years invested in school, continuing education, and

Some of the mentioned professions, law, accounting, medicine, legally require a degree, a minimum number of years invested in school, continuing education, and a license. Then there are malpractice suits, longer work hours, doctors being on-call, etc. If you fuck up as a doctor, someone dies. If you fuck up as a programmer, you might cost someone some money. Usually nothing happens, you just fix it. Computer programming is one of the very, very few fields where you can make a lot of money doing very little work without having even a GED. Plenty of programmers make 80-100k/yr, and a great number of lawyers make less than that. How many state-level attorneys make <70K? You'd be surprised. In summary, programmers have other advantages than pay, and still get paid rather well considering the low barrier to entry in that profession. My work situation is pretty plum, and I don't exactly have a formidable resume. I'm grateful. If I were aiming to be a doctor, lawyer, or accountant, I'd still be in school. And in the long term, I'll end up making more than if I pursued one of those paths, I'd wager.