In some sense all white collar jobs are sitting at a keyboard typing, but I think we can usefully go a bit beyond that and look at the interiority of the people performing the labour - and also the management and economic structures surrounding it.
Programming is really unusual in that it doesn't have the "profession" structure of doctors, lawyers etc - nor does it have the classic Taylorist assembly line. What does characterise it is traditional companies trying to structure it that way and being absolutely obliterated in the market by "outsider" companies doing things with smaller, less hierarchical teams.
At one edge it resembles (and competes for hiring with) the "quant" side of financial trading. Also a focus-heavy industry.
Programming is really unusual in that it doesn't have the "profession" structure of doctors, lawyers etc - nor does it have the classic Taylorist assembly line. What does characterise it is traditional companies trying to structure it that way and being absolutely obliterated in the market by "outsider" companies doing things with smaller, less hierarchical teams.
At one edge it resembles (and competes for hiring with) the "quant" side of financial trading. Also a focus-heavy industry.