In 1983 I spent 10 months, three hours a night, four nights a week learning COBOL IMS DB/DC. It cost $2,300. I’ve been in IT ever since and it worked in to a very nice six figure income.
Yep - I got a BS/MS in Comp Sci by 1980 and had a wonderful career. Windows changed everything around 2000 as computers got cheap, they crashed and I needed 10 times as many to do the same job as Windows machines are mostly suited to run one thing.
I got laid off in 2015 and walked away from it. I lit up my pensions, got a clerical job using a computer and will fully retire when Medicare comes around in 3 years.