I think it's a mistake to draw a hard line between "systems" software engineers and hardware engineers - e.g. I would see myself as a software engineer, but an

I think it's a mistake to draw a hard line between "systems" software engineers and hardware engineers - e.g. I would see myself as a software engineer, but an pretty comfortable with HDL, or even modifying it, even if my primary job was on the driver side. And also as a Brit who has since got a green card in the US a couple of years ago - I'm not sure if the UK is a great comparison point - brexit decimated that level of engineering in the UK - the sort of companies that need that expertise are at the multinational level or have fabs, none of which is really true for the UK isolated from Europe. Every company I worked for/with in the UK has either moved offshore or completely closed down since. And low demand causes low wages.