In my opinion, there's just a shortage of experienced engineers. Everyone these days is chasing the latest Javascript framework hype and practicing the next bi

In my opinion, there's just a shortage of experienced engineers. Everyone these days is chasing the latest Javascript framework hype and practicing the next big modern language, e.g. Rust or Go. But most important infrastructure open source is written in C++ and to maintain a cross-platform library linked into hundreds of apps, you need years of practical working experience to accurately estimate the side effects down the line from a seemingly innocent patch. There's few people who have that experience. Plus as the greybeards retire, more and more companies need to hire this kind of developer to keep their own stuff running. So the people who could do open source usually have a waiting list for future freelancing clients.