Again, we’re talking about jobs (and whether they will remain in the future), not professional designations. Licensed professional engineers are usually referred to as PEs, but even if you want to call them engineers it is clear that not all engineers of that sort work in engineering. In context, we can establish that we are talking about engineers in the worker sense, not the professional license sense.

Is English a second language for you? Maybe context doesn’t translate well. English is certainly bad for assigning multiple meanings to words and relying on context to figure out which meaning applies.

> I think lots of software people want to call themselves "engineers" because it sounds like someone who should be paid more money.

How would describing the job by what it is, literally by dictionary definition, garner more money?

I am aware of the time physicians started calling themselves doctors to try and ride on the coattails of academics, so I think I understand the angle you are trying to come up with, but this isn’t like that. In this case engineer was already the word in the dictionary that existed to describe the work.

Even outside of "software engineering" there are tons of people working jobs that almost everyone would consider "engineering" that don't require a stamp. Chemical engineers, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers, tons. Only ~5% of chemical engineers have passed the PE, I guess there are essentially no real chemical engineers then?

Even in a civil engineering firm, most likely the kind of engineering you're talking about, only about half will actually be licensed and have a stamp. Tons of people will work on a project and figure out a lot of details, then work with the person with the stamp to sign off on the implementation details. Their work is undoubtedly still "engineering", but they don't have a stamp.