When I [briefly] looked into this, it seemed that positions in astronomy were extremely competitive, extremely limited, and generally had a requirement of PhD and the usual toppings alongside. Love to know if I was wrong somehow? Astronomy has always been a passion, but I never pursued it because of certain irritating things in cosmology that left me somewhat jaded.
Not an astronomer but have an advanced degree in physical science, very experienced with optics and engineering, and incredibly interested in the science. I looked into technical positions at a couple of giant telescope projects (not VRO) and got nowhere. I did speak with someone informally about it and was told that the science community was pretty decoupled from the instrument and facility builders.
Really depends what you mean by “a career in astronomy”.
Being a research astrophysicist at a university or major lab likely requires a PhD and (to achieve tenure) many years of postdoctoral experience.
However, systems like Rubin (which I have worked on) require complex data processing and management systems to make them effective. Building those doesn't require expertise a PhD astronomy — although some level of interest and enthusiasm certainly helps — but rather the sorts of engineering skills that the typical Hacker News reader might possess. Skillsets like that are increasingly vital as astronomy moves towards large-scale, data-intensive infrastructures like Rubin, SKA, etc.
That said, it's certainly true that taking your career down this path isn't likely to be as well remunerated as a career in commercial software development (although that varies a bit with geography).
