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Comment by mmarq | Hacker News Reader

Software development and other tech jobs were low-status professions in Europe (the UK being a partial exception) up until a few years ago. Once a friend told me some thing like "it is not fair that you make more money than I do, I have a degree in literature and, with all due respect, you are just a guy that works with computers". This was not an absurd conversation to hear anywhere in continental Europe in the early 2000s.

For a brilliant 20 year old German in 2005 becoming a primary school teacher or a pencil pusher in a random government office would have been a better option than working in tech. With "better option" I mean double salary, double pension, better healthcare, more holidays. So it shouldn't surprise anybody if foreigners are overrepresented in tech jobs in Germany, and it has nothing to do with European lazyness (had you said risk-aversion I could have agreed).

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This is something I’ve noticed working with European people and also traveling.

I think there is a cycle here where because working with software is considered low status, many good software people leave, and lots of smart people probably do not go into the field at all unless they truly love software. This would tend to drive the talent pool down, IMO, which keeps away good software jobs, keeping it low status.

In the US for example writing software is usually considered wholly different from “IT” whereas in Europe IT encompasses both. That’s probably another thing bringing its status down. You are grouping software engineers with people plugging in printers and solving Karen’s support ticket (no offense IT people).

> In the US for example writing software is usually considered wholly different from “IT” whereas in Europe IT encompasses both. That’s probably another thing bringing its status down. You are grouping software engineers with people plugging in printers and solving Karen’s support ticket (no offense IT people).

oh boy, if you think IT is just pluggin in printers and fixing easy support tickets you are easily mistaken.

What about network and system engineers? Those who keep the cloud and global internet running? Those are considered IT (atleast in europe) and are definitely not low quality, easy to learn jobs.

Yea that's exactly the poster's point. IT in the U.S. is tech support, you're describing something similar to devops

Agreed with the sibling comment, that’s kinda my point, in the US those would also not be considered IT (depending on what they do).

How do you define "low status"? Is elderly care "low status" according to your definition? It's not according to mine. I consider myself a proud member of a "normal status profession" where my skills can be adequately utilized.

I don’t, I can’t manipulate the public perceptions of professions. In Europe software developers don’t enjoy the same social standing of high-school teachers, so a rational 20 year old will prefer to be a high school teacher than a software developer.

The average IT guy is still more productive and less replaceable than somebody with a degree in literature doing unpaid internships in coffee shops. But for some reason the former used to enjoy less social recognition, at least in continental Europe.

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