<story><title>The Bulk of Software Engineering in 2018 Is Just Plumbing</title><url>https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/plumbing</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ellius</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m reading Thomas Sowell&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;Intellectuals and Society,&amp;quot; and while I disagree with a lot in his arguments and his view of the world, I think he nails a key point about the philosophy behind free market economies. He says that conservative intellectuals don&amp;#x27;t view inequality and other social tragedies as mainly the consequence of policy, but rather as an inherent part of the human condition. Markets may act as a mechanism that &lt;i&gt;conveys&lt;/i&gt; those inequalities, but they are not necessarily their cause. Prices are his first example. Commanding a higher salary doesn&amp;#x27;t mean you&amp;#x27;re a harder or even more skilled worker, it just means that you produce something that is judged by buyers (employers) to have a higher positive impact on their well-being.</text></item><item><author>ken</author><text>&amp;gt; I believe that many in the field are overpaid relative to the difficulty of the work they do.&lt;p&gt;I believe that &lt;i&gt;every&lt;/i&gt; programmer is overpaid relative to the difficulty of the work they do -- or, more accurately, that The Market doesn&amp;#x27;t pay based on &lt;i&gt;difficulty&lt;/i&gt; of work.  Software pays so well because the product scales so well.&lt;p&gt;Successful pop musicians don&amp;#x27;t do work that&amp;#x27;s 100 times more &amp;#x27;difficult&amp;#x27; than software engineering.  They do work that scales even better (copying digital music; playing to arenas; branding on merch).&lt;p&gt;Having worked outside the software world, I absolutely do not believe that software people are any smarter, on average, than anyone else.  Ever see a plumbing or electrical or structural system fail spectacularly?  Other types of workers absolutely need to understand interactions between multiple complex systems, deal with obsolete and incompatible systems, and deal with changing and conflicting requirements and regulations.&lt;p&gt;If software is any more complex to deal with than physical systems, it&amp;#x27;s only because the architects and implementors let it get that way.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sampl</author><text>Funny, I was just reading that same example of his in his book “basic economics”, and it makes sense.&lt;p&gt;Still, couldn’t you say the same for a feudal structure? That nature has power imbalances, and the role of king only conveys that inequality?&lt;p&gt;Instead, we’ve intentionally built a more egalitarian system (and we’ve all prospered because of it), seemingly against nature.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Bulk of Software Engineering in 2018 Is Just Plumbing</title><url>https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/plumbing</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ellius</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m reading Thomas Sowell&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;Intellectuals and Society,&amp;quot; and while I disagree with a lot in his arguments and his view of the world, I think he nails a key point about the philosophy behind free market economies. He says that conservative intellectuals don&amp;#x27;t view inequality and other social tragedies as mainly the consequence of policy, but rather as an inherent part of the human condition. Markets may act as a mechanism that &lt;i&gt;conveys&lt;/i&gt; those inequalities, but they are not necessarily their cause. Prices are his first example. Commanding a higher salary doesn&amp;#x27;t mean you&amp;#x27;re a harder or even more skilled worker, it just means that you produce something that is judged by buyers (employers) to have a higher positive impact on their well-being.</text></item><item><author>ken</author><text>&amp;gt; I believe that many in the field are overpaid relative to the difficulty of the work they do.&lt;p&gt;I believe that &lt;i&gt;every&lt;/i&gt; programmer is overpaid relative to the difficulty of the work they do -- or, more accurately, that The Market doesn&amp;#x27;t pay based on &lt;i&gt;difficulty&lt;/i&gt; of work.  Software pays so well because the product scales so well.&lt;p&gt;Successful pop musicians don&amp;#x27;t do work that&amp;#x27;s 100 times more &amp;#x27;difficult&amp;#x27; than software engineering.  They do work that scales even better (copying digital music; playing to arenas; branding on merch).&lt;p&gt;Having worked outside the software world, I absolutely do not believe that software people are any smarter, on average, than anyone else.  Ever see a plumbing or electrical or structural system fail spectacularly?  Other types of workers absolutely need to understand interactions between multiple complex systems, deal with obsolete and incompatible systems, and deal with changing and conflicting requirements and regulations.&lt;p&gt;If software is any more complex to deal with than physical systems, it&amp;#x27;s only because the architects and implementors let it get that way.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jadedhacker</author><text>This is far too celebratory of markets. Markets pay for things that people of means want. If I make a useless toy that delights a rich person I am paid lavishly. If I make a useless toy that delights a poor person I get next to nothing.</text></comment>