[pessimizer]

My disagreement with this perspective is that demand is measured in dollars, not desire. The perception of a problem in the supply pool is a problem with the quality expectation (or need) per dollar of salary, rather than a problem in the workforce itself.

I think that programming is just at a difficulty level where employers really either have to spend the money, or realize that their business model really isn't viable if it depends on a large supply of competent $36K programmers.