I relate 100%. Everyone at my current job is sick of the soul-crushing work as a software developer that people just accept as part of the job. The side projects are so fun, we just want to do that for our real job.

We call it "Write the Right Code", and I'll shamelessly drop the post since I'm curious if this is the same pain you feel. https://cosmonic.com/blog/write_the_right_code/.

Maybe software engineering can be better if more people speak up to the culture that many engineers just get used to.