I disagree - non-software companies feel entitled to price employees based in relation to their peers rather than in relation to the value they add to the business (and possibly misuse their tech labour because they never hired an architect that could actually steer it to be as valuable as it could be) but Jack the EE might be a perfectly servicable developer. There's a lot of theory we learn in school that Jack would need to pick up himself but don't assume you're imbued with a special skill that sets you apart from the rest of the employees.

The company should definitely be paying more out of their pocket to employ good tech talent, but I'm not so certain whether it's good for society for all that created value to be given to the developer who happened to create it. I think there is a big value gap in how much developers can produce with relatively little labour compared to, say, a car mechanic - but I think that it might be best for everyone if a really big proportion of that value gap was sliced up and distributed more evenly across society in the form of social programs to benefit us all.

I don't see how you're disagreeing with me. I didn't say that Jack the EE couldn't be a perfectly serviceable developer. I've worked with a number who are (and a few who excelled). My point is that the management teams (with no one with software experience) perceive one specific person's relative ease at picking up programming as the general case for programming. This causes them to underestimate what it takes to actually build up the software portion of their business. This happens especially for non-software companies in the same way that software companies might underestimate the difficulty of other fields (how many startups have we seen posted here on HN that are composed of primarily programmers and think they'll revolutionize the fashion industry, the car audio industry, or the banking industry?).

And since management teams in large companies tend to grow out of whichever departments are the primary domains, if software is always seen as tertiary then managers with software background are consistently absent or too few to clear up this confusion.

If Jack can teach himself how to program competently, you’ve just made a great argument for him to stop fucking around being an EE and switch to a software job where he can make a ton more money.

Just because an arbitrary person can learn how to do X, it doesn’t change the fact that there is a huge shortage of people who can competently X. The price paid for software development is a product of supply and demand, not how “special” software developers are.

They value people based on 'visibility' at my place. Unfortunately, some people who get that visibility are just putting out their own fires. I had a tech lead that was not very good in my opinion, but the business and management loved him.

Sometimes I think about becoming a mechanic. They make good money.

Having worked at a car dealership- don't work at one of those, at the very least. Like many established industries, being a car mechanic doesn't have too many ways up from there- you can get all the certs you want, but you'll never be management- and compensation increases are based more on tenure than anything else. If you can teach yourself and then get into a performance garage or something like that, go for it! You'll likely wind up better off buying a project car to learn on or going to a technical school in off time than going full-tilt into mechanicary- and you'll have a chance to see if it's right for you before you switch. Also, if you like that stuff, and want to create things, consider mechanical engineering of some flavor.

I had a 25-30 year old Caprice and then tracked a new Camaro. I have a bit of mechanical experience with all the work that comes with those. Of course electric vehicles will be the next big thing.

I definitely would not work at a dealer or chain. Being part of a small company or your own would be great. Not moving up wouldn't be a big deal in that kind of role.

On a side note, I'm confused why everyone is obsessed with moving up. Can't people just be happy where they are? I really don't see much difference in my company between the various levels, nor is it a very big promotion at 7%.

Electrical engineering is a nightmare compared to software engineering. It also involves a lot of programming. It's just that hardware businesses don't give a damn about the software.