Intentionally or unintentionally, do you rate an arbitrary programmer by the language he/she uses ? For instance, do you give more credit to a kernel developer (let's say he/she uses assembly and low-level C) than to a web developer (HLL and frameworks) ?
Let's consider the following stack :
-- Generic Applications (Web and Non Web) -- Level 3
-- Libraries and Frameworks -- Level 2
-- Drivers / Compilers -- Level 1
-- Operating Systems -- Level 0
I believe it is correct to make the following assumptions : 1 - Consider an average generic application. Let's forget the difficulty of scaling Web applications like Google, Amazon, Twitter and Facebook. 2 - I know that you can have gurus in each layer of the stack. Let's consider again an average programmer in each layer. 3 - Ignore the time needed to study/use a framework (e.g. Spring, Ruby on Rails... Django). This is important because I am expecting comments like : "but a compiler developer doesn't know framework XYZ").
Do you think that a programmer from one layer can do the same work as the programmer in the layer above? I'm positive that the same does not happen in the opposite direction. If so, do you think he/she deserves more respect than programmers from the top layers?
I'd really like to know the opinion of different people. For instance, in a company, do you feel that distinction/separation ? What about compensations? Do you think that a kernel developer earns more than a Web developer?
Edit : Problem with line feeds.