It's not only programmers. Its managers as well. Its anyone who subsumes their job to be their identity! At my old company (big corporation) management shuffl

It's not only programmers. Its managers as well. Its anyone who subsumes their job to be their identity! At my old company (big corporation) management shuffles happen every 9 months to a year. One manager went from having 45 people working under him to 0. The guy had a nervous breakdown as well. I heard he swam in one of our large number of fish tanks. That could be a bad rumor though. Anyway he was admitted and all that. The company did pay for everything till he made it back about 4-5 months later after which he quit. I remember him looking at me down the escalator and saying "its not worth it man - its not worth it." So don't let your paycheck or your job be your identity. Also understand that programmers at tech companies (except google/facebook) are at the bottom of the totem pole. So political shit and pressure all end up on the programmer. So try to not be a bottom level programmer for long - either become a tech lead or a manager asap.