I mentioned it to my boss this morning, also a technical type, he told me that and $3 would buy me a cup of coffee. (He's a good guy and I like him.) I nodded amiably, and as non-defensively as I could, said, "Well, some select for it." But who really does? It may get my foot in the door in some situations, and it might be considered a feather in the cap for my organization, but it's certainly not my key to the top tech job at a fortune 500. I have to earn that kind credibility in other ways.

But it's something, right? It's an achievement, and it signals that I have the ability to reach goals. That says I'm worth something, doesn't it? And it probably has some economic value too, doesn't it? How would I quantify that? That's my main question.

I'm probably asking to be smacked down here, but that's a risk I'm willing to take. I've seen a sort of anti-Stackoverflow current before, but you can't deny that it helps people, and (I'll hedge with "virtually") all of us technical types use it at least as a supplement to documentation and reading the source, and I'll brashly assert that many of us use it as a first resort thanks to Google. And if I've helped people, that makes me feel really good, so I do have a lot of respect for Joel Spolsky and Jeff Atwood, and I've wanted, for a while now, to make a meaningful contribution to a resource that has helped me so much. I'm now starting to feel like I really have. To me, the economic question is one way of measuring that contribution.

Evidence: http://stackoverflow.com/help/badges/51/python?userid=541136

Addendum, gaius said: "I'm afraid your boss was right. It may even be a negative, as it paints you as someone with a lot of free time."

My response (from below): Well it certainly could do that. If it does, I can always chalk it up to sour grapes. But I think I have a good answer to that, if I encounter it in question form.

I also go to a lot of tech meetups and give tech talks. I'm ten-years married with no kids. I can spend my time how I choose. Only I have something to show for all of my evenings over people who only play games or read click-bait. I want children, eventually, but I'm not ready yet. I'd also like another graduate degree, and I'd like even more experiences in finance, as now I've only been a financial advisor and worked in risk data and architecture.

I had over 150 answers on tax and retirement planning on all-experts.com with strong ratings, and they've deleted that material because it's out of date, and now I just have a line on my old resume (it's not even in my current one). I like that much of my material will not be dated as quickly on Stackoverflow.