> How about a cordwainer? Many are highly qualified professionals, and I bet they're "blue collar" all the same.
Yup. That's largely where we get into the classism thing. "White collar" doesn't say anything in particular about skill or earnings (or even education, necessarily; you don't need a degree to be white collar); it's a class signifier.
> As for being a profession, relatively few programmers are independent. Most work under a boss, with the same hierarchical constraints as a factory worker.
Same goes for doctors (in most countries), accountants, etc. And of course, a middle-manager is white collar. While collar doesn't necessarily mean self-employed/company owner/bourgeois. It's more complicated than that.
Yup. That's largely where we get into the classism thing. "White collar" doesn't say anything in particular about skill or earnings (or even education, necessarily; you don't need a degree to be white collar); it's a class signifier.
> As for being a profession, relatively few programmers are independent. Most work under a boss, with the same hierarchical constraints as a factory worker.
Same goes for doctors (in most countries), accountants, etc. And of course, a middle-manager is white collar. While collar doesn't necessarily mean self-employed/company owner/bourgeois. It's more complicated than that.