There will still be fine programmers developing software by hand after AI is good enough for most.
This fallacy seems to be brought up very frequently, that there are still blacksmiths; people who ride horses; people who use typewriters; even people who use fountain pens, but they don't really exist in any practical or economical sense outside of 10 years ago Portland, OR.
No technological advancement that I'm aware of completely eliminates one's ability to pursue a discipline as a hobbyist or as a niche for rich people. It's rarely impossible, but I don't think that's ever anyone's point. Sometimes they even make a comeback, like vinyl records.
The scope of the topic seems to be what the usual one is, which is the chain of incentives that enable the pursuit of something as a persuasive exchange of value, particularly that of a market that needs a certain amount of volume and doesn't have shady protectionism working for it like standard textbooks.
With writing, like with other liberal arts, it's far from a new target of parental scrutiny, and it's my impression that those disciplines have long been the pursuit of people who can largely get away with not really needing a viable source of income, particularly during the apprentice and journeyman stages.
Programming has been largely been exempt from that, but if I were in the midst of a traditional comp sci program, facing the existential dreads that are U.S and Canadian economies (at least), along with the effective collapse of a path to financial stability, I'd be stupid not to be considering a major pivot; to what, I don't know.
Or double down on applied ML?
'Sure the 1880 start of the industrial revolution sucked, all the way through the end of WW2, but then we figured out jobs and middle class for a short time, so it doesn't matter you personally are being put at the 1880 starting point, because the 1950s had jobs'. Huh?
Why are you constructing a strawman in your second paragraph? No one said or even implied that, you just made up your own quote you're attacking for something reason?
Tramps/homeless/tramp camps was a part of life. Huge groups of men lived in 'boarding houses' their entire lives. Most people today don't even know what boarding houses were. There were huge populations that traveled as migrant field workers. The reality looked much different than post WW2 employment.
Sure you said people found other jobs. But really, lots of people didn't. Or didn't find jobs that allowed them to live outside boarding houses and have families. There is a whole big picture waved away with 'found jobs' that implies post WW2 jobs/lifestyles, when in fact that is not what happened post industrial revolution, and did not happen until much later, and was not guaranteed to happen ever.
Ratelimited so editing:
People handweaving away legitimate fears with 'people found new work' are implying it is on the level/quality of life. My 'strawman' is pointing out their 'found new work' was shittier work and a shittier life and that the handwaving/minimizing peoples fears with such a hollow statement is bullshit and should be called out as such. 'found new work' is nothing more than 'people didn't all die'.
No, you are the only one implying this, no one said anything about this which is why I said it is a strawman. I said nothing about the quality of work found, only that new work was found. That may or may not be the case for today's situation, no one can know and I am not in the business of prognosticating so.
Before: Born to a modest family in England, Slater worked as an apprentice in a textile mill, learning the mechanics of spinning frames.
After: In 1790 he emigrated to the United States, where he introduced British‑style water‑powered textile machinery, earning the nickname "Father of the American Industrial Revolution." He built the first successful cotton‑spinning mill in Rhode Island and became a wealthy industrialist.
2. Ellen Swallow Richards: Teacher → Pioneering chemist and sanitary engineer
Before: Taught school in Massachusetts while supporting her family after her father's death.
After: Enrolled at MIT (the first woman admitted), earned a chemistry degree, and applied scientific methods to public health, founding the first school of home economics and influencing water‑quality standards.
3. Frederick Winslow Taylor: Machinist → Scientific management consultant
Before: Trained as a mechanical engineer and worked on the shop floor of a steel plant, witnessing chaotic production practices.
After: Developed Taylorism, a systematic approach to labor efficiency, consulting for major firms and publishing The Principles of Scientific Management (1911), reshaping industrial labor organization.
4. John D. Rockefeller: Small‑scale merchant → Oil magnate
Before: Ran a modest produce‑selling business in Cleveland, Ohio, struggling after the Panic of 1873 reduced local demand.
After: Invested in the nascent petroleum industry, founded Standard Oil in 1870, and built a monopoly that made him the wealthiest person of his era.
5. Clara Barton: Teacher & clerk → Humanitarian nurse
Before: Worked as a schoolteacher and later as a clerk for the U.S. Patent Office, earning a modest living.
After: Volunteered as a nurse during the Civil War, later founding the American Red Cross in 1881, turning her wartime experience into a lifelong career in disaster relief.
6. Andrew Carnegie: Factory apprentice → Steel tycoon
Before: Began as a bobbin boy in a cotton factory in Scotland, later emigrating to the U.S. and working as a telegraph messenger.
After: Invested in railroads and iron, eventually creating Carnegie Steel Company (1901), becoming a leading philanthropist after retiring.
7. Lillian M. N. Stevens: Seamstress → Temperance leader
Before: Earned a living sewing garments in a New England workshop, a trade threatened by mechanized clothing factories.
After: Joined the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, rising to national president (1898‑1914) and influencing social reform legislation.
8. George Pullman: Cabinet‑maker → Railroad car innovator
Before: Trained as a carpenter, making furniture for a small New England firm that struggled as railroads expanded.
After: Designed and manufactured luxury sleeping cars, founding the Pullman Company (1867) and creating a model industrial town for his workers.
9. Mary Elizabeth Garrett: Schoolteacher → Medical education reformer
Before: Taught at a private academy in Baltimore, earning a modest salary.
After: Used her inheritance to fund the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (1893), insisting on admission of women and establishing the first women’s medical school in the U.S.
10. Henry Ford: Farmhand → Automobile pioneer
Before: Worked on his family farm in Michigan and later as an apprentice machinist, facing limited prospects as agriculture mechanized.
After: Built the Ford Motor Company (1903) and introduced the moving‑assembly line (1913), making automobiles affordable for the masses.
The guys that ended up spending their lives living in boarding houses with other men, never starting a family. The guys that ended up living in tramp camps traveling the country looking for work. The families that ended up as migrant workers. The people that broke and lived in flop houses or those long term hotels in downtowns.
That is the real picture no one shows. What does 'find new work' after the industrial revolution look like for the average person, and the answer isn't 'become Henry f'ing Ford' now is it post WW2 style middle class employment.
What did losing your stables/small scale manufacturing/family farm/etc and adjusting to post industrial revolution 'finding a new job' look like? Saying 'Henry Ford existed' doesn't add anything to understanding that.
You're the one who asked the question...
Sorry but if you're going to mean something other than what you say, then you should specify that in what you say rather than have people guessing or answering questions you yourself asked then saying, but no that's not what I mean. Well, yeah, we don't know unless you say so, and that's exactly where the goalpost moving is, you literally did it in the above comment.
'new jobs come' is very much pushed by the AI set when people bring up concerns. I was simply trying to define what that looks like. Apparently it's 'just become Henry Ford or a Rockefeller'. Good luck with that talking point.
1. Blacksmith → Railroad Carriage Foreman
Before: Local village blacksmith, shoeing horses, forging tools; works long hours in a small shop; income modest but steady; reputation tied to local farmers.
After: Takes a job at a nearby railway workshop as a metalworker assembling and repairing iron carriages; works in shifts under foremen; more regular wages and slightly higher pay; moves to a rail town, his kids gain access to a school; he loses some independence in his new setting but has marked gains in job security and cash pay.
2. Handloom Weaver → Textile Factory Machine Minder
Before: Home-based handloom weaver producing cloth on commission; schedule flexible but income fluctuates with orders; household-centered labor.
After: Employed in a textile mill running power looms; fixed hours, supervised by overseers; steady wage, production quotas; exposure to somewhat harsher factory conditions, but more reliable monthly income and potential for overtime pay.
3. Sailmaker/Canvas Artisan → Industrial Tent or Sail Factory Worker
Before: Small workshop making ship sails and canvas goods for local ships; skills highly specialized and tied to maritime trade.
After: Joins a larger factory producing canvas goods and tents for military contracts or industrial customers; moves from bespoke work to standardized production; learns new machine operations; steadier demand, less artisanal pride but higher throughput.
4. Small-Scale Farmer → Agricultural Wage Laborer / Seasonal Harvester
Before: Owner-operator of a few acres, subsistence mixed with small-market sales; vulnerable to crop failures and market price swings.
After: Sells or loses land, takes wage labor on larger farms or in orchards; seasonal work, long hours during harvests; cash wages replaced self-provisioning, children sometimes work; potential to move seasonally to find work.
5. Canal Boatman → Dockyard or Stevedore Worker
Before: Independent canal boat operator transporting goods along waterways; income from tolls and freight; lifestyle itinerant but autonomous.
After: With canal traffic declining due to railways, he becomes a dock laborer unloading goods at a port; work is bunched into long, physical shifts; income less variable but less autonomy; often joins laborer networks or unions.
6. Carpenter (Craft) → Construction Gang Member on Urban Projects
Before: Skilled carpenter building houses and furniture for local clients; runs small crew, has flexible custom work.
After: Migrates to a city for large-scale building projects (tenements, bridges); works as part of an organized gang, specializing in one repetitive task (e.g., formwork); wages steadier including opportunities for overtime, though with less creative control.
7. Tanner/Leatherworker → Factory Leather Stitcher / Machine Operator
Before: Family tannery producing saddles and boots for local markets; knowledge-intensive, smelly but respected craft.
After: Enters a leather goods factory operating stitching or cutting machines for mass-produced footwear; learns machine maintenance; working environment more regulated, discipline stricter, pay more regular.
8. Rural Cooper (Barrelmaker) → Brewery or Canning Works Employee
Before: Independent cooper making barrels for local brewers and farms; demand falls as metal containers and standard packaging rose.
After: Hired by an urban brewery or canned-goods plant to maintain wooden vats or operate filling machinery; moves closer to urban amenities; job is less entrepreneurial but offers steady pay and sometimes benefits.
9. Watchmaker/Clock Repairer → Precision Machine Operator or Assembler in Electrical or Watch Factories
Before: Skilled artisan repairing and crafting clocks, serving local clientele; income from repairs and small commissions.
After: Joins an urban precision workshop or early watch factory assembling parts or operating lathes; narrower tasks but higher volume and a connection to emerging industrial technologies; more predictable pay and potential for apprenticeships for children.
10. Fisherman (Small-Boat) → Cannery Worker in Coastal Town
Before: Independent small-boat fisherman selling catch to local markets; income seasonal and weather-dependent; family-based operation.
After: Cannery expansion offers steady work in fish-packing plants, processing, salting, or canning; shift work with set hours and piece-rate opportunities; his income is quite a bit steadier, though the job is somewhat repetitive and sometimes hazardous.
Here's a sketch of the bigger picture we can see from these scenarios:
Greater wage stability: Moving from piecework, self-employment, or seasonal income into factory, railway, or dock wages usually meant steadier cash pay and more predictable household budgeting.
Larger scale means less autonomy: Many tradesmen lost control over hours, pace, and methods, trading independent decision-making for supervised, repetitive tasks.
Increased urbanization and mobility: Job shifts often prompted moves to towns or industrial centers, changing family networks and access to services (schools, markets, hospitals).
Routine and discipline: Factory and industrial work imposed fixed schedules, time discipline, and stricter workplace rules compared with artisan or farm life.
Skill reorientation: Some workers adapted existing skills to machines and assembly roles, while others lost craftsman status as specialized knowledge gave way to standardized production.
Household changes: Women and children were drawn into wage labor more frequently; domestic production declined as cash purchases rose.
Health and safety trade-offs: Improved incomes sometimes came with worse working conditions, crowding, and new occupational hazards.
Social mobility mixed: For some, steady wages enabled upward moves (education for children, home purchase); for others, loss of independence and precarious labor markets limited long-term mobility.
Community and identity shifts: Occupational identities tied to craft or land weakened; new worker solidarities and urban social institutions (mutual aid, unions, churches) grew in importance.
Consumption patterns: Predictable wages led to more regular purchase of manufactured goods, changing diets, clothing, and household items.
The classic old person advice is to just walk in somewhere, give the owner a stern handshake, and you got a job, and if that job could pay your mortgage, then problem solved. Whereas now, to become a buggy whip maker (or whatever), we've developed yhe expectation that you go to school for 4 years and start out at the bottom of the income ladder. If the income we need to pay for the basics (which admittedly are different) requires a lifetime of experience, then it's impossible to pivot
It is the younger people who started their career after the financial crisis that got the wrong signaling. As if 2010-2021 was normal instead of the far from equilibrium state it was.
This current state of anxiety about the future is the normal state. That wonderful decade was the once in a lifetime event.
Did you respond with a fallacy of your own? I can only assume you’re not in or don’t have familiarity with those worlds and that has lead you to conclude they don’t exist in any practical or economical sense. It’s not difficult to look up those industries and their economic impact. Particularly horses and fountain pens. Or are you going by your own idea of practical or economical?
They are incredibly niche side industries largely for the pleasure of wealthy folks. Horses still have a tiny niche industrial use.
Pretty much the same story with any craft.
I'm a professional woodworker. One-off tables in a garage might not be a great business, but millwork, built-ins, and cabinetry in homes is a great business. You're likely not exposed to cabinet or architectural woodwork shops that build high-end homes, or that just do renovation for that matter.
It’s not that nobody needs cabinets or doors. It’s that automation, transportation, and economies of scale have made it much cheaper to produce those things with machines in a factory.
I'd like to see numbers backing that up. My personal impression is that you have a small number of custom woodworkers hustling after an ever smaller number of rich clients. That seems like exactly the same problem.
In case of woodcraft, there is some tangible result that can be appreciated and displayed as art. In case of custom software, there is no such displayability.
Its still here, today.
I wouldn't dismiss an industry based on business failures. The restaurant industry still exists, despite it being almost a guarantee that you will fail.
There's also stores with hand-knitted clothes and bears, sculpters and painters.
Yes, all of these are niche - but they survive because they embrace a different business model.
Because it is a different business, to teach people. So many places are teaching nice things that could help little to get a job with living wage.
The teaching they do is conferences - they host archeology, psychology, and engineering mini-conferences and talks, today. Whilst also being one of the biggest libraries in the town.
This isn't somewhere handing out a bunch of useless Certificate IIs. Its somewhere you need a degree to even get in the door.
Their primary income is actually from trade unions - almost all of them rent their office out of the building, because of its established connections to everyone who knows something. And all members get access to the library, equipment and most talks. (Though not the rat warrens that still run under the town from the gold rush.)
These jobs have not disappeared, but they have become much less common and attractive.
There is not really a similar market in software.
I'm not saying there won't be fine programmers etc. but with woodworking I can see how a market exists that will support you developing your skills and I don't see it with software and thus the path seems much less clear to me.
however I suppose at the point where I need to explain that and all the ways in which the two things are dissimilar it becomes a book in itself.
But at the risk of being uninteresting, I know of incredibly niche software projects that were done for a single rich benefactor as one-offs simply for their personal use-case and no one else. Years in the making and quite well paid. In one case effectively lifetime employment for the sole developer.
They are obviously incredibly rare, but they do exist.
However, they are totally irrelevant to discuss in this context since it's a rounding error of 1% of 1% of current developers who would get such roles either via luck or skill.