Via Don Box:

In general, I would be very hesitant to encourage anyone to pursue this career path. Like writing a book, the only people who should do it are those who can’t not do it. I’m hopeful however that there will be many generations worth of funding for those few people who absolutely must live in the world of executable abstractions. Whether we’ll outnumber (or out-earn) doctors and lawyers is another matter altogether.

He also uncovers the great secret of interviewing programmers. The secret to hiring good IT folks is to differentiate between those people who want a paycheck and those people who can’t see themselves doing anything other than working with computers. The other secret is that the only people who can tell the difference are people who fall into the latter category. So, once you’ve polluted your organization with people who just wanted a job, you’re basically relying on luck to see you through.