Custom furniture/cabinetry is already a pretty tough market, and woodworking is such a common programmer hobby that if a significant chunk of us decided to make a go of it the market would get heavily oversupplied pretty fast :).

I’ve had people tell me I should try selling some of the furniture I make and my response is always that I made the mistake of turning a hobby into a career once, I don’t intend to make that mistake again, and at least software still pays pretty well.

Depends what you mean by woodworking

I work with a guy who does decking (gardens, caravans, etc) and builds sheds, fences, things like that and he does very well indeed (he's also incredibly good at it to be fair)

I have a historic house with a hand carved/ uniquely shaped door. The jamb rotted and we paid a woodworker $4k to create a replacement. The door itself would easily cost $25k to replace. So, move to a major historic area with hand carved doors and you could make some decent money.

look at layoffs.fyi. chances are he will be laid off pretty soon. and if not tomorrow, give it couple extra years until AI gets even better. it is one-way road, down the hill.

not woodworking. farming. get a pot of land and grow your own food. do not participate in economy at all. that's the only survival.

> Whatever your feelings on the future of the industry are, it's hard to imagine you'll find more professional success in artisan woodworking than artisan software.

A small percentage of the market, maybe a fraction of a percent, are still willing to pay for hand-built goods - bonus if it's thoroughly modern but retro (steam-punk keyboards, maybe).

Exactly zero percent of the market is willing to pay for hand-built software.