I read this across the data science sub where it might be more prevalent but I disagree.
I don't have a bachelor's degree and I'm making another 200K TC this year.
My realm is platform. Which is this kind of massive all-encompassing sort of ideology. How do you really demonstrate that. I don't even remember what I had for breakfast half the time but I build cool things. Yes I have cool things to talk about in my career that's for sure. But I can prove it too. It also means I tend to get out of getting grilled on factoids in interviews.
And then beyond all that share your knowledge with the world. Write, it's good for you.
The project on the front page there I'm planning on doing some unique things too and trying to take it to y combinator.
You've got things like this: https://hireryan.today/2021/10/04/modifying-docker-image-layers-in-real-time-on-macos/
I still don't think anybody has really solved this I know it's a longstanding stack overflow post. Certificates in containers are a pain in the ass. I'll bet 90% of the people in this sub have run into this but very few people know how to fix it at a global level. I'm able to show nuance understanding across to any number of systems.
You're right though some companies don't care. And I have to slog pretty hard to find the ones that will pay me some money. But when I find those people that really look at my work and really take it in I tend to be well rewarded.
This side itself is pseudo enterprise. Terraform, EKS, gitops, varnish for caching, automated cert renewals, cloudfront for static asset distribution etc.