<story><title>The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry</title><url>https://www.efinancialcareers.com/news/2022/11/why-is-there-a-drought-in-the-talent-pool-for-c-developers</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>intelVISA</author><text>As a C++ enjoyer I would 100% have learned Rust if it was around when I started... just for Cargo alone.&lt;p&gt;Problem is now I&amp;#x27;ve already done my time in the Makefile trenches there&amp;#x27;s little incentive in me re-learning another systems lang and having to compete with lots of smarter people, with more Rust exp, for jobs whilst giving up all my arcane knowledge of CMake and friends.&lt;p&gt;Rust being popular atm is great for C++ if I&amp;#x27;m honest as it siphons away a new gen of systems programmers over to another lang allowing me to sell my dark services for more coins.</text></item><item><author>rychco</author><text>I’ll offer a perspective unrelated to pay: It’s a pain to start learning C++, and even after you do, older devs will roast the hell out of your code because your book&amp;#x2F;tutorials of choice forgot to mention a crucial (in their opinion) feature that you absolutely should&amp;#x2F;shouldn’t use! Not to mention you’ve only programmed on Mac&amp;#x2F;Linux so far &amp;amp; windows is totally different, has a different compiler, different ways to install libraries, different C++ standard features supported, etc.&lt;p&gt;I like C++, and tooling has come a long way, but it’s so much easier to download rust&amp;#x2F;Python&amp;#x2F;node and you’re basically set on every platform &amp;amp; immediately ready to go. NOW consider pay, and even someone enthusiastic about programming C++ will reconsider.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ahepp</author><text>&amp;gt; it siphons away a new gen of systems programmers over to another lang allowing me to sell my dark services for more coins&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve always been curious about whether it really works this way. First order, one would consider supply and demand leading to increased wages. But whenever I&amp;#x27;ve looked into the reports of &amp;quot;COBOL programmers are getting paid a fortune because there are so few of them alive!&amp;quot;, the reality has been that wages are ... unimpressive.&lt;p&gt;My hypothesis is that as the talent pool shifts elsewhere, the market dries up. For instance, new projects aren&amp;#x27;t started in COBOL any more (well, at least anywhere I&amp;#x27;ve seen...). You&amp;#x27;re left doing maintenance on ancient systems, where the calculus is always &amp;quot;this needs to be cheaper than a new solution&amp;quot;. Maybe it&amp;#x27;s the &amp;quot;liquidity&amp;quot; of the job market for a given language?</text></comment>
<story><title>The pool of talented C++ developers is running dry</title><url>https://www.efinancialcareers.com/news/2022/11/why-is-there-a-drought-in-the-talent-pool-for-c-developers</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>intelVISA</author><text>As a C++ enjoyer I would 100% have learned Rust if it was around when I started... just for Cargo alone.&lt;p&gt;Problem is now I&amp;#x27;ve already done my time in the Makefile trenches there&amp;#x27;s little incentive in me re-learning another systems lang and having to compete with lots of smarter people, with more Rust exp, for jobs whilst giving up all my arcane knowledge of CMake and friends.&lt;p&gt;Rust being popular atm is great for C++ if I&amp;#x27;m honest as it siphons away a new gen of systems programmers over to another lang allowing me to sell my dark services for more coins.</text></item><item><author>rychco</author><text>I’ll offer a perspective unrelated to pay: It’s a pain to start learning C++, and even after you do, older devs will roast the hell out of your code because your book&amp;#x2F;tutorials of choice forgot to mention a crucial (in their opinion) feature that you absolutely should&amp;#x2F;shouldn’t use! Not to mention you’ve only programmed on Mac&amp;#x2F;Linux so far &amp;amp; windows is totally different, has a different compiler, different ways to install libraries, different C++ standard features supported, etc.&lt;p&gt;I like C++, and tooling has come a long way, but it’s so much easier to download rust&amp;#x2F;Python&amp;#x2F;node and you’re basically set on every platform &amp;amp; immediately ready to go. NOW consider pay, and even someone enthusiastic about programming C++ will reconsider.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>larsrc</author><text>I did my time in the Makefile trenches, too. I&amp;#x27;m happy that I&amp;#x27;ve learned other languages. There will always be smarter people than you, but you will bring your particular knowledge and do new things. Keep on learning!</text></comment>