The American Programmer: Dead or Alive?

Picture credit: Kids.Nasa.Gov
Has the American programmer met his demise? Not hardly, according to John Challenger:

The death of the U.S. programmer is a myth. Absolutely,'' says Challenger. ''Much of the programming that's done today is highly complex and requires an immense amount of discussion with a lot of people. They're part of a development team. They have to deal with operations to customize the programming. There's a lot of in-person, on-site understanding that would really get lost if the work was shipped out to someone who is anonymous overseas... There is so much demand for programming -- people who can take technology and adapt it to a situation.