I pursued computer science because of the career prospect, the fact that the salary is not capped by regulators and I had the grades to get accepted in a program. I am not a senior developer, but am never out of work for more than 2 months in my entire 15+ years career with the up and down in tech. I live comfortably in a low-cost-of-living area. I am not looking for FIRE. I switched roles every few years so that I could learn new tech stacks and get perspective from different teams.
The increased responsibilities of senior+roles are daunting. I once had the energy in my younger days to jump into the challenges, but ended up jaded after not getting the results. People have been just looking out for themselves. (Not wrong!)