TLDR:<p>I&#x27;m a self taught coder, due in part to the recession of 08. I would encourage anybody that has a desire an passion to learn, don&#x27;t let anybody discourage you as there are a lot of &quot;negative nellies&quot; floating around out there.<p>If your long term career goal is to be CTO at a big company, then you should probably go school. Other wise there is plenty of room in the market for all types of developers&#x2F;codes.<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&#x2F;jack-dorsey-on-programmers-2013-3" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&#x2F;jack-dorsey-on-programmers-20...</a>