Let's talk about the COBOL job market since I think what you're really asking is whether you can have a stable career writing COBOL. Contrary to the annual arti

Let's talk about the COBOL job market since I think what you're really asking is whether you can have a stable career writing COBOL. Contrary to the annual articles we see decrying the lack of COBOL programmers and suggesting that becoming a COBOL programmer is a way to get a high salary easily, the actual job market for COBOL programmers is quite different from those of the rest of the software engineering industry. In aggregate, across the United States there are a number of large companies that still use COBOL such as Eversource or Labcorp. Unfortunately, the teams using COBOL typically aren't growing. They may hire 1-2 COBOL programmers a year. This means that outside of a few banking hubs like NYC, you may need to move for your job if they require you on-site. A number of these companies have also outsourced their COBOL jobs and gotten used to paying low salaries for hires. This means that there's a large dichotomy in salary, some pay very little (I think an ex-colleague with 15+ years experience was offered 35/hr) and some are in the 100K+ range. A good example of this is searching indeed for COBOL jobs (https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=cobol&l=&from=searchOnHP&vjk=f71eeddbcea0b662 https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=cobol&l=&from=searchOnHP&vjk=f...). There are less than 2000 jobs on indeed across the US, and while the median range looks to be around 100K, many pay very a lot less. As far as I can tell nobody is making anywhere close to FAANG money with COBOL. Take a look at the locations of these jobs as well. If you want to find a job within 50 miles of you, there may only be a few options. Anecdotally, my ex-coworker hasn't worked in COBOL in the last 8 years, maybe even longer. Now let's talk about a few of the positives. Many of these jobs are relatively stable, especially the government ones. They may also be relatively low-stress and be close to the traditional 9-5. Being paid 100K+ in Albany, NY is good money for the area, potentially on par with being paid 200k+ in SF. Unlike javascript, you won't need to keep investing in learning new frameworks every 1-2 years.