[mleo]

As a percentage of good to mediocre, maybe. Engineers of 40 years ago were probably better than engineers 20 years ago. Less of them and more constraints they had to deal with. Democratization of technology makes it easier for more people to use. It applies to programming as much as just using a computer.

[isakmarr]

Depends how you define "better". I'd argue that modern engineers are better generalists, and engineers 20-40 years ago were better specialists.