According to Borland's 1997 lawsuit against Microsoft, Anders Hejlsberg had a signing bonus of $1 million plus stock options to move to Microsoft. That sounds like a rich language designer.
I think of language design like running. Almost everyone can run, a lot of people run because they enjoy it, some of those enter competitions, but mostly because they enjoy the social and competitive aspects. Very few people make a living by running, and almost no one gets rich as a professional runner.
A lot of people enjoy making new languages. Some of these languages are used by more than a handful of people, though most of those are domain-specific languages. Only a few languages enter wide-spread use, and of those language designers, very few get rich from that work.
I think of language design like running. Almost everyone can run, a lot of people run because they enjoy it, some of those enter competitions, but mostly because they enjoy the social and competitive aspects. Very few people make a living by running, and almost no one gets rich as a professional runner.
A lot of people enjoy making new languages. Some of these languages are used by more than a handful of people, though most of those are domain-specific languages. Only a few languages enter wide-spread use, and of those language designers, very few get rich from that work.