> Once you've become a highly paid software engineer it's very human to try and justify your status by claiming that programming is exceptionally hard and therefore your status/salary is justified.

Salaries for the vast majority of occupations are driven by the supply and demand for employees - its a job market after all. Demand for programmers is increasing. Supply is increasing too, but is generally limited by, among other things, how technically "hard" the job is. "Deserve" isn't even part of the equation.