The Hacker Spirit was largely subsidized on the (relatively) high salaries afforded to engineers*.

What happens when that well dries up?

Plus the relative freedom available to said hackers in the past, that is now being choked by the very same tools they've built.

We like to think of ourselves as capable systems designers, coming up with complex reliable/durable/highly-available/distributed systems to be proud of. But we can't stop and think about the only system that really matters in the end.

* Not saying it was 100% the case, nothing ever is, but you can't deny that a large part of historic and modern hacker culture grew from well off places who could afford it. Sure, sure "necessity is the mother of all invention" and all that, but that breeds a different kind of innovation.