How do you train a former middle manager at an auto factory or an assembly line worker to become a competent software engineer? There seems to be unlimited demand for competent software professionals. But the field is one that involves a lot of complexity and where skills get old fast. It's a high-IQ profession. A small percentage of the population is talented enough for a career in software engineering. Another thing is that there are a lot of smart people who are just not technical enough.

The pool of people from which programmers and software architects etc. can be recruited is quite small. The combination of sufficient intelligence and stomach for dealing with highly technical stuff all day is rare. Absent strong AI, that could actually significantly slow down accelerating gains from technology absent very significant productivity enhancements through AI. But software development is still very much a craft. There is very little in it that can be automated. It's a messy world where building complex systems that work and are maintainable is very expensive because of the manual work required. Even after all these decades it's an immature industry.