That's imposed by the job market, not natural thing to exist. In fact, it's very much unnatural.

I mean, maybe my first job was an outlier, but I literally mean chose to specialize. Out of the people who graduated within 5 years of me, two got into Python because of the project, and just stayed there like you said... One of them could only never have run his code before pushing commits, the other one was middle of the road.

Another went strict UI - he wasn't unable to do other things, he got hired after a couple years and said this is what he wanted to do.

Two more started in Python, then decided they wanted to do exploit stuff, the guy ended up going back to programming after he was let go for non-work reasons, and I don't know where he ended up... He worked for Amazon for a while.

I guess a good chunk did keep using what they're using and happen to specialize like you say, but I saw a lot of people choose something intentionally, a few years after doing something different too. Most of the team looked for something using their existing languages or even stack when we all moved on, regardless if they picked it or fell into it

I don't think it's difficulty - like you say, if you've learned a couple high level languages, jumping to a new one is mostly syntax

Maybe it's a comfort/effort thing? A lot of the people who chose to specialize left their work at work. Only one person I worked with was like me - several would adapt to whatever was practical without difficulty, but without a clear best opinion I always pick something new, because it makes things more fun... He was fun to work with, because the client loved him and he pitched the weirdest and most fun features

Maybe it's just personality thing... I'm now convinced my school probably wasn't an outlier though