In reply to Davida.

@Rob is probably right - there will always be a place for SAS in most industries. However, every SAS customer I have spoken to wants to reduce their SAS license bill and is ultimately open to the idea of other solutions. As an experienced SAS programmer there is vested interest in keeping it going and salaries high. As a graduate leaving university and looking at a career spanning the next 30 years I might be more wary of tying my future to an unsustainable commercial model in the light of open source alternatives like R. [Disclosure: I work for Tibco Spotfire]