Many people who program professionally are not called programmers, either by the people in charge of titles at their organization or by government statisticians

Many people who program professionally are not called programmers, either by the people in charge of titles at their organization or by government statisticians. For example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics thinks that "software developers" (which it has a fairly rigorous definition for) have a median salary nationwide of about $90k, which is rather north of self-reports on glassdoor. (And, incidentally, below prevailing salary offers for fresh graduates at AmaGooFaceSoft in 2013. That's news-you-can-use for some of you.) However, if you take any of the numerous career paths which can quite easily result in you making doctor/lawyer/banker money, it is highly unlikely your business cards will still say Programmer on them, even if programming is a large portion of your day-to-day activities and value proposition. Take a quick gander at the HN leaderboard, for example: many of the people on it are well-compensated and program professionally, but comparatively few are of them (us?) are titled as programmers. Relatedly, calling yourself a programmer is not necessarily a successful tactic if you want to make $PICK_A_SUCCESS_METRIC via doing programming. http://www.kalzumeus.com/2011/10/28/dont-call-yourself-a-programmer/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/2011/10/28/dont-call-yourself-a-pro...