Only 0.3% of the world population are programmers

19 points·ilrwbwrkhv··17 comments

I just realized how small of a number (26.8 million) that is in comparison to the >7 billion people in the world.

So much leverage created through technology by so few.

Well, it sounds like a lot to me. Many do not work at all. Kids, older people, etc. So working people that would be like double? Also many many more in IT in general.

And even fewer of those programmers (e.g. Linus, Stallman) are actually the ones that created 80% or more of the software that the rest rely on.

Yeah, I guess around 10% are actual good programmers, then 0.1% are 10x guys?

Can confirm. I'm part of the 89.9% that are shit.

Disagree. Only a decent programmer would admit he is shit.

Would a decent programmer get a bad rating, fail code screens, and be paid under $100k?

Sometimes. There is a lot of randomness in life.

Depends where you are. In Europe, for example, it's not uncommon for developers to earn half of that.

True, I understand that. I was assuming non-rural US.

Where did you got that statistic from ?

Where did you get the numbers from? I am curious if it counts people who do not exclusively write software but who are nonetheless also programming as part of their job.

The Good / Bad / Ugly quotients would be good to know.

Just apply the normal distribution to the 26 million.

Wonder what the most common occupation is, worldwide.

Its gotta be farmer, or rancher, or something agriculture related.

I don't know, that's been scaled pretty far, where farms and especially ranches don't take many workers.

My guess is teacher.

> I don't know, that's been scaled pretty far

... in developed countries. Meanwhile, the two most populous continents (Asia and Africa) still have a lot of small-scale farming.

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