> 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.

Yet usually woodworking is not a viable business. As a craft - sure. As a day job to provide for your family - not really. Guys who created a custom tables for me five years ago are out of business.

Pretty much the same story with any craft.

This comparison is hardly apt in the way it is formulated, but it is fitting when considering tailors and seamstresses. A few decades ago, numerous tailors made custom-made clothes and skilled seamstresses repaired them. Today, since clothes are made by machines and the cost of production has fallen significantly, making bespoke clothes has become a niche job, almost extinct, and instead of repairing clothes, people prefer to buy new ones.

These jobs have not disappeared, but they have become much less common and attractive.

high quality carpentry has a market of people who buy one off projects for lots of money.

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.