Research from IT job website Dice.com indicates that there is a shortage of .NET developers across the United States. Reasons cited for the lack of .NET developers include specialization concerns, and a lower salary for .NET programmers compared with other languages, such as Java.

Research from IT job website Dice.com indicates that there is a shortage of .NET developers across the United States. Reasons cited for the lack of .NET developers include specialization concerns, and a lower salary for .NET programmers compared with other languages, such as Java.

As Dice's Managing Director Alice Hill put it, "More than 10 years into .NET, it's safe to say tech professionals will not be pigeonholed. Likewise, demand is there—one of the most frequent refrains we hear from clients is distress in trying to find .NET talent and they've posted more than 10,000 positions requesting .NET experience."

From Hill's perspective, the .NET framework is easy enough to learn, and is a good mid-career skill to have. Many employers are eager to find entry level developers, and only 21 percent of employers on Dice.com were looking for .NET developers with 8 to 10 years of experience.