[owlglass]

While loyalty to the craft can have the side effect of generating more value to an employer, I don't think the two notions are antagonists. Get better at your craft and you'll have more opportunity to operate as a mercenary.

[intelVISA]

A crafts-merc is the ideal, a pure merc won't contribute beautiful code and a pure crafter won't grasp the business value of their elegant monads.

[aschearer]

Perhaps you're right. Perhaps I am being to literal in my comparison, but I see tension when I compare craftspeople of the past / other industries with our own. Instead of honing our skills under an expert for many years, we swap jobs and even sub-disciplines frequently. Can we cultivate "craftsmanship" in that manner?