Security engineer here. Your viewpoint is exceptionally skewed to the point of being wildly inaccurate. Being good at security work is like any other skill and has a payout distribution more akin to being a star performing artist than a 9-to-5 job. That is, everyone hears about the people that make millions, but they’re actually missing that most people make far less than that, even when they’re good at their jobs. And in your case the people who are not good at their jobs also end up in jail. And just like learning to play music, you can get really good at it if you practice for 10 years–but most people won’t, and even then if you’re in the top 1% but not the top 0.1% the difference in pay might be several orders of magnitude. Just being a software engineer is a far more reliable way to be well off.