That's not what I said. We never require front end work from someone who only wants to do back end work. My point was if you have intermediate backend programm

That's not what I said. We never require front end work from someone who only wants to do back end work. My point was if you have intermediate backend programming ability with a DBA background and you're concerned about getting a backend role you should be careful, yet clear about what you're willing to do. Generally speaking, if a candidate comes across as willing to help out on a case by case basis but the vast majority of their workload is backend that's an easier hire by far. Is the trade-off of a potential 95/5 split of time worth it to the developer? That's a personal decision to the developer. Unless you're never going to be writing code that is directly consumed by a front end or full Stack developer it is a good idea/practice to understand basics of the front end. So yes, you are correct that if the poster never was willing to touch the front end he'd be harder to hire for the company but that's just because we want people to be open to new technology and the full Stack. Either way, I think it'd be unwise to not learn basics of the opposite side you're on to stay relevant and be an attractive hire. N=1.