[Mgccl]

Theory cs could care less about coding abilities. It's never a bad thing to know how to code, but I can go though the entire PhD program without coding a single line of code. (Well not really, one of the professors in my PhD program committee recommended me to do one systems course. other than that, I just prove theorems. )

[PeterisP]

Yes, we've got a bunch of people like that in our PhD program as well - but 100% of them, despite not writing a single line of code for years, could still easily get a paying job in industry and be mostly okay (though less happy) there.

If you can prove theorems, then you can also code CRUD websites by following a tutorial, and get paid for that.

If you can't write code if your life depended on it but can write papers on human interface or methodology issues, then you can get a job as a system analyst in any large software development company and keep not writing code there.

[zerr]

There is also another moment: yet another CRUD job in 3rd world country vs PhD in USA. And no need to struggle for H1B.