Because the corporate hierarchy demands it. Front-line workers are expendable, much like front-line soldiers. Corporations are not democracies, and neither are militaries.

If your job is to write and commit code, you are the corporate equivalent of infantry. In short: a grunt.

And if I am being treated as a grunt, I will act like a grunt aka I don't care more than my bosses. I will even abandon ship at the sign of incompetence and point out the incompetence to others.