I'm starting to wonder if, in this day and age, there really is such a thing as a "career job." The system which predominated in the 50's of spending your entire career working for a big corporation and then living off of a retirement pension seems to be faltering. The auto industry is just one example...
To me, programming offers a challenging, generally fun activity with more potential for innovation than nearly any other "job." I didn't get into software to be the modern day equivalent of an assembly line worker. Though I can sympathize to some extent with the position of the "rank and file" engineers (i.e. that many software engineering jobs are a means of putting food on the table), I'm also optimistic that the opportunity to build great things finds those who have a desire to do so.
'I'm starting to wonder if, in this day and age, there really is such a thing as a "career job."'
Stop wondering. There is not.
In fact, arguably, there almost never was. I live in Michigan, and a lot of "career" people are currently staring down losing their retirement in the last 5 years of their expected productive life, or losing their pension after retirement, or similar things. Some "career", some "guarantee". Even many of those "careers" may turn out not to have been, post facto. (Yikes!)
In my opinion, anyone under 40 (conservatively) should be planning on there being no pension for them and no social security.
Good luck with that last bit. Remember that the closer you get to it, the greater the concentration of scumbags (check my profile if you don't believe me).
My kid brother went to work for the phone company straight out of high school('68), back when it was the phone company. He hasn't changed employers since, although he's changed divisions, and his employer has changed names a few times ;-) Of course, he started out as a lineman/installer, and he's now a senior consultant racking up 100K international frequent flyer miles per year.
To me, programming offers a challenging, generally fun activity with more potential for innovation than nearly any other "job." I didn't get into software to be the modern day equivalent of an assembly line worker. Though I can sympathize to some extent with the position of the "rank and file" engineers (i.e. that many software engineering jobs are a means of putting food on the table), I'm also optimistic that the opportunity to build great things finds those who have a desire to do so.