This question was posed by Jeff Atwood. Easy answer. Because they can find jobs. I have interviewed loads of people who were missing even the most basic skills. And these were not all junior programs, this happened even at the senior level positions. They are easy to weed out in a technical interview, but not every company gives one. I think companies are learning not to hire people based solely on manager opinions. And the land rush to get any programmer at all is over. I remember doing an interview ......