Way back in the 90's I reached a conclusion that a programmer or sysadmin or hardware guy is now just the new auto mechanic.
'98 or so I was shopping for replacement software for my uncles business (y2k prep) and we went to this firms office, and basically everyone in the office, the owner, all the developers, the sales guy, the guy who would come out to install the hardware... every one of them could have been in their high school football team 10 years earlier. They were doing this kind of job because there was money in it full stop. They took us out to dinner and the conversation only comfirmed that snap perception. You could substitute "propane and propane products" in place of software and IT hardware without changing a thing about any of them.
Perversely today I probably wouldn't use the same comparison because auto mechanic is probably more nerdly and interesing persuit today than it used to be.
I think what I mean to say it's now a trade.
You might be a nerd in that trade just like you might be a nerd welder, but it's no longer required. You don't even have to be a wannabe nerd although many are.
Countless people in those jobs with no special love of it, and no fundamental curiosity.
School counselors told them it was going to be in demand, so they did that.
I think it's both better and worse today since then.
Obviously the sheer mass of IT work needed today, and the sheer mass population of people needed to do it, means that there are a many many people doing IT work that aten't good at it and don't love it.
Obviously today it's no longer special to to work with computers.
And there is also the ever present dislike for intellectuals in general that hurts nerds even at the same time when there is some nerd cache from making money. (actually I bet the nerds don't even make the real money any more. they get harnessed by the business types)
But I think it's also true there are more actual nerds today and they are more accepted than in the past. Still outnumbered by wannabes and everyone else, and the real nerds still not really liked or taken seriously by most, but more and better than 20 years ago.