Who would have thought that having experience would matter in software engineering as well... Just like it does for every other field.

It's mind boggling how hard business people keep trying to replace software engineers.

I suspect it might be because it's a real skill which businesses depend on so this makes engineers hard to replace and gives them more leverage to push back on unethical business conduct. If you're a manager, your value lies entirely in your ability to stay aligned with business objectives and to align others with those objectives. You have no value besides that hence you have zero leverage to push back on anything which stands in the way of those objectives, including ethics. Engineers have some leverage and hence they can push back a fair bit without putting themselves in the firing line but that makes them a problem for leaders of the organization.

Compare that to an HR manager; they can't lift their pinky finger if it doesn't align with business objectives; even a slight hint of doing so would immediately put them in the firing line because alignment is almost 100% of the job.