As others already said the people actually making the software all this time had little to no autonomy over what they are making.

At any big company even the head of an engineering department is subservient to the latest powerpoint brainfart decided upon in a weekly meeting of the marketing and sales teams, if it impresses the executives they’re going to say “can you make it do this” and the expected answer is “yes and it will take about this long to do”. And then go back to their desk and start figuring out how to make it work.

It works this way because we’re a steeply wealth-sorted society and software developer money doesn’t buy you into the “having a say in the direction of the tech industry” class, not by a long shot, and especially not in 2026. If it even puts you in the “ever going to be able to actally retire” class it’s because you were already hanging onto the bottom of the investor class by the skin of your 401k.