Interesting thread- can't agree though.
I know for a fact that there are a great many technical writers that cannot find work, and many more that gave up on the profession after the tech bubble burst over a decade ago. The truth is that tech organizations are often forced to downsize many times over, and face losing their most important assets- their engineering staffs. Downstream groups are decimated first- technical writing, QA, tech support, etc. These groups are downsized, and sometimes eliminated completely in an effort to maintain engineering staffs. Engineering personnel are then forced to take on these roles.