Re: C and then some
then there aren't really many useful alternatives to C.
Depending on the domain, you may find plenty of Fortran and Lisp fans out there… ;-)
PyPy does a fantastic job of optimising Python byte code and has over time achieved quite astonishing results. Unfortunately it doesn't play well with Cython, which is a great alternative for those occasional hotspots in libraries.
But the general drive to shoe-horning types in Python so that compilers can optimise should be resisted: code becomes bloated and unreadable and thus difficult to maintain. And then it turns out that YAGNI but it ticks a load of boxes, which is great for the project managers.
Where Python does need to improve is on multiple CPUs and, due to the way Python works, this is hard™ but there have been significant improvements and investments, due to the ecosystem built around Pandas and Numpy.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
