On Sun, Feb 08, 2004 at 10:17:00AM -0600, Michael Shaw wrote:
<snip>

>    Finally as a recently laid off programmer with 25 years service I'd
> caution you to seriously consider going into the programming field.  Today
> with all the off-shoring by taking place in corporate America programming is
> an imploding career field salary-wise.  $60,000/yr american programmers now
> have to compete against $6,000/yr programmers in India, and we're losing
> fast.  Hack programmers no longer cut it.  You must know your stuff across a
> wide range of topics (client/server, GUI/Web interfaces, DBMS's, SQL, etc)
> and know it well to compete.  It would also help to be in a niche market
> such as device drivers.

That's awful but it's also something I have been thinking about
lately. The rate of information rollover for technology is starting to
concern me. In 25 years how many times has your skillset needed serious
refreshing? I think I've read that in IT, knowledge only last 5 years. I
know that none of the Java programming I did in '97-99 is relevant. 

I ask b/c I'm thinking of leaving technology altogether w/in the next ten
years to teach anthropology. The technology of 2,000 years ago seems
much more stable than what we do some days...

Best of luck, 

- Bryan