I've been noticing a trend for the past five years, where people (often with PhDs) who start their careers working as researchers for industrial research labs (e.g., IBM Almaden Research Center, HP Labs, Intel Research, etc.) end up switching careers and become software engineers. I'm curious about whether the trend is due to personal interests (e.g., wanting to create production-quality software instead of research prototypes, wanting to avoid "publish-or-perish" pressures, higher salaries offered for SE positions) or due to other reasons (I have noticed a gradual winding down of industrial research labs in the past decade). I currently work at an industrial research lab. I enjoy doing research but I'm concerned about my ability to remain a researcher during my career.