[ericmcer]

Barrier to entry is what makes some jobs pay more than others. I think programming is easier than working in fast food, but you could literally take almost anyone with an elementary school education and turn them into a productive fast food worker in a matter of days.

I might not be good at real estate, but I bet in a weeks time I could do a passable job filling out necessary documents and doing open houses.

There is no reality where someone who has no programming experience is anything other than a huge liability if you give them a week of training and then assign a feature to them and tell them to start coding, testing, and making pull requests for it.