As a lawyer who can code (years of experience as a professional software developer and years of experience as a practicing attorney) let me assure you, this is not the case. There just isn’t that much overlap, despite the common wisdom that such a thing should exist, it’s very hard to actually find.
Also, not everything outside of faang is ‘basic code’ - there’s a whole wide world out there!
Consider two broad but otherwise generally viewed as unrelated (however, not mutually exclusive) skillsets: A and B. Lots of people are great at A and lots of people are great at B, but the intersection of the two is generally small (perhaps "law" and "programming" could be reasonably argued as examples of A and B here). There are large numbers of people employed doing A, and similarly for B, often quite successfully in both cases.
Now, there's some much smaller set of individuals who have a reasonable grasp of both skillsets A and B. Recall that they're not mutually exclusive (are any skillsets, really?), just not often seen together. It seems that this set of people would be uniquely positioned to potentially provide immense value over the perhaps small (but even more marginally serviced) field of needs where A and B intersect. The value here isn't in the individual's capability for A or B in isolation, but in what they can provide where A and B cross.
I realise the above is a big generalization and perhaps hugely oversimplified, but it's interesting to think about the different, seemingly unrelated skillsets where there may be great potential from some cross-pollination of ideas to bear new fruit. I do think that "programming" in general, perhaps in some form not as it's conventionally understood today, is becoming somewhat of a new literacy, at least to the extent that there seem to be countless existing businesses or fields of inquiry that could benefit from programmers who are also experts in their traditional domains. However, one could also come up with lots of different examples for A and B above, which may not even include programming at all.
I think in software (and CS in general) this advice is especially valuable because software and computing is the glue that can connect and materialize ideas into something that seems tangible. It's also something that's often approachable by an individual and doesn't always require a mountain of capital to achieve.
[0] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/XvN2QQpKTuEzgkZHY/being-the-...
https://techcrunch.com/2020/07/19/the-dual-phd-problem-of-to...
Being able to natively express and review logic related to some legal software would be useful indeed, but honestly your team will need someone good at gathering requirements from non-technical folks either way and my guess would be that a lawyer that can vaguely code would likely be retained as an expert in the field but offered compensation like an entry-level to mid- developer by a startup.
I think that SMEs are great to have on the team, and I'd happily jump at the chance to contract with one that's got some vague coding experience as well - but I'd contract that out to pick their brains specifically on their specialty rather than try and shoe-horn them into a dev role. If I found a lawyer that had returned to development full time that's a different jazz - but you also need to keep in mind if the now-lawyer that used to be a developer actually wants to go back to full time development.
No we do not. Some of us do
No, we do not.
In my experience disrupting spaces it's easier to find software engineers that are open minded when working with other professionals. Not like, super easy, most of the SWEs I've worked with can't do it, even on embedded when working with EEs... but open minded SWEs are out there, albeit usually more expensive or with good pay and job security by working on a less-softwarey company than "Big Tech".
Not just "basic code". There are thousands of companies doing just as challenging work than FAANGs do. There's innovation happening all over the place.
There's probably a place nearby that needs a basic developer for writing
No, most of them don't, because most of them aren't themselves working at the apex.
The people working at the apex fall for the Apex Fallacy, including the ones that think they don't but think that the whole field tends to.
Interestingly, you might be wrong. There's a continuing push to get people in the industry who can code for startups wanting to disrupt the space. You'd probably be the lawyer who can code and any lawyer-adjacent tech company would love you.
When we think "programming", we think FAANG but in the real world, there are thousands of places that need basic code slung.