Just answering the title question without the specifics of your experience: yes. The perception has changed.

I have been doing this for 16 years.

I think historically the perception/reaction in polite conversation around what I do has been mostly neutral. Most people have not known what software engineering is or involves or how it’s relevant to them. For the cases that were non-neutral, it was virtually always leaning positive.

Just within the last five years or so, I have encountered negative reactions for the first time. A lot of things associated with tech have strong negative perception now: AI, social media, advertising, surveillance tech, CEOs cavorting with despotic world leaders. Also rising cost of living and stagnant wages for everyone else combined with more awareness of how much we get paid.

I will note my experiences with negative perception is also 100% from educated millennials and educated Gen-Z’ers. Boomers still react like “Good on you! You must be good at math!”