I mean this is already true from my perspective, and not very surprising. Back in the early 90's when I was a C++ programmer I was making about what I make now

I mean this is already true from my perspective, and not very surprising. Back in the early 90's when I was a C++ programmer I was making about what I make now in absolute numbers, but of course the dollars went a lot further back then. There were fewer gigs, but also fewer people qualified to do the work. Today most code is written at a significantly higher level of abstraction, there are more programmers and more projects, the money and perks are still good but the market is more competitive than it was back then. It's also _far_ more fragmented into tech silos, which should work against my theory I guess... but idk. From my perspective its always a mistake to think you're safe and things will never change. The perceived rarity of any skill set should trend down over time if possessing the skill is valuable.