From the number of women interested in dating him, that's where. Women go gaga to date a doctor, but they're about as interested in a software engineer as they are a plumber.
I'm not debating the work and how it compares to other professions, or even how the pay compares, I'm just pointing out what I perceive to be society's perception of the prestige of the profession. Here in America, software does not have a lot of prestige, not compared to doctors and lawyers.
Lawyers don't even make that much money, and a lot of them drop out and change professions; we have a glut of lawyers. The ones at the top make a lot, but your rank-and-file ones don't, they probably do worse than your average software engineer. But it doesn't matter: society holds them and doctors in far higher esteem than engineers or programmers of any kind. It's a product of America's anti-intellectual tradition.
Now of course, there is a big factor of relativity involved: if a woman is a waitress or secretary or cashier, for instance, she'll probably be very interested in dating an engineer or programmer (doubly so if she's a single mom struggling to raise some kids). But if she's a lawyer or doctor or she has the traits necessary to attract a doctor, she won't be. If she's an engineer herself, she probably would be interested, but since she's such a minority in her field she'll also have her pick of male engineers and won't be single long.
I mean that I don't see as great a number of lawyers and doctors having little interest in their personal appearance and constantly referencing science fiction and fantasy, which I think explains it as well as any supposed lack of social status for software engineering as a profession.
Besides that, I don't see how you can really justify calling medicine or law "less intellectual" than engineering or programming.
That's not true at all. Engineers with basic hygiene and fitness are snapped up like doctors. Don't compare 23 yr old engineers with doctors who, after school and training, are already 30 and in their high innome jobs.