The tech industry projects a 'talent shortage' of senior software engineers that these companies are unable to find. But instead they get 100+ junior level applicants which are ignored by them.

The problem is that companies are reluctant to provide training for juniors or entry level applicants as they prefer to hire one experienced senior developer just to do the work of 20 junior developers with a $100k salary + stock. However, most companies are unable to afford this and they simply complain that there is a 'talent shortage' of these specific developers.

Even if a junior gets to the onsite interview, they are asked to write a series of algorithm tasks on a whiteboard to prove that they are qualified. Simply having a 1st class CS degree is not good enough for any candidate. So the actual 'talent' they are looking for are developers who are at FAANG companies. If they do find them, they are directly hired (No tech interviews) which is rare.

> I don't want to spend years of my life and who knows how much money learning a new skillset only to discover I've joined an ocean of low-skilled coders who won't have any serious job prospects for 5+ more years. :/

The point here is that if you are applying for a junior/graduate or entry level job, you now need to further differentiate yourself from the other candidates and programming is simply not enough. If you were to switch careers into this one, you have to be prepared to show what you have done to convince the hiring manager to take you on, since they can just either hire a senior or an internal applicant* to take the role instead.

* Some companies hire candidates internally and prefer them over external ones due to their connections to the company.