The recurring dream of replacing developers

Summary

Why We've Tried to Replace Developers Every Decade Since 1969 The Pattern That Frustrates Everyone 07.12.2025, By Stephan Schwab Every decade brings new promises: this time, we'll finally make software development simple enough that we won't need so many developers. From COBOL to AI, the pattern repeats. Business leaders grow frustrated with slow delivery and high costs. Developers feel misunderstood and undervalued. Understanding why this cycle persists for fifty years reveals what both sides need to know about the nature of software work. The Dream Was Born During Humanity’s Greatest Achievement When Neil Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface in 1969, the world witnessed what organized human ingenuity could accomplish. Behind that achievement stood Margaret Hamilton and her team, writing Apollo’s guidance software by hand, catching critical errors through careful review, and proving that software could be mission-critical. The Apollo program demonstrated that software development was essential to achieving the impossible. Yet it also revealed something that would frustrate business leaders for decades to come: writing software required specialized knowledge, intense focus, and significant time investment. The dream of making it easier—of needing fewer of these expensive specialists—began almost immediately. COBOL: Business People Will Write Their Own Programs The late 1960s and 1970s saw COBOL emerge with an explicit goal stated in its name: Common Business-Oriented Language. The vision was clear: make the language read like English sentences, and business analysts would write their own programs. No need for specialized programmers. "If we make the syntax readable enough, anyone who understands the business can write the code." This vision had genuine appeal. Software was becoming essential to business operations, yet programmers remained a scarce, expensive resource. COBOL promised to democratize software creation. What happened instead? COBOL became another p...