It would make it much easier to find a job and the salaries would be a higher (assuming one has a degree).
Developers really don't realize how bad they have it. If you have friends who passed to be doctors, nurses, lawyers, they can all have a much easier and longer career.
You will see what are your prospects after 15 years of development, if you were not driven out of the industry, it's grim.
I'm sorry your observation leads you to have such a negative view of things. Clearly your lived experience must be radically different from mine.
I've been a software developer for 30 years now, and never got a degree. I do have friends that are doctors and lawyers, and I prefer my career path to theirs. I started working and earning at 18, rather than going through 8 years of expensive schooling. All these years later (your 15 years doubled), I'm still in-demand, still earning reasonably well, and don't experience the levels of stress or work the long hours my doctor and lawyer friends do.
But hey, when I was young, it was just doctors and lawyers who earned big money. Now it's doctors, lawyers, and software developers, so that's a huge gain for software! And still, only about 75% or so of software developers have degrees at all, let alone eight years of school and two degrees like are required to be a doctor or lawyer.
I've spent the last month interviewing for new "Senior Java Developer" positions, and I can assure you, having a degree does not mean one's prospects are automatically good. Or that one know what one is doing, even.
I'd take my financial experience as a college dropout software engineer over that of a doctor or lawyer any day. I get to spend my 20's debt free and mega rich (by young adult standards), and I've been able to save most of my considerable income. I think the average doctor's net worth might surpass mine in their late 30's, and would certainly accelerate beyond what I could ever keep up with. But so what? I get to spend an entire life never stressing about money once, while they have to stress over student debt for 15-20 years.
My "prospects after 10 years of development" are going to be "figuring out what to do now that my house is paid off and I don't need to make half as much as I do anymore". Compare those to a doctor's prospects after 10 years of college: "Time to start making money for the first time!"
Developers really don't realize how bad they have it. If you have friends who passed to be doctors, nurses, lawyers, they can all have a much easier and longer career.
You will see what are your prospects after 15 years of development, if you were not driven out of the industry, it's grim.