Personally, as a person who is a self-taught techie, but also a chemist, so maybe a psuedo-independent view. I think a part of the lack of respect comes out of what is a backlash STILL against the collapse of the tech bubble. I think the image of technology was greatly diminished both by the crash and some of the ludicrous claims that people made at that time. You had techies who were running off their mouths saying this fad or that fad would be the next best thing since sliced bread. When it didn't pan out some companies lost a good amount of money, damaging the view of techs.
This was exacerbated by slick snake-oil salesmen who knew just-enough tech jargon to sound like they knew what they are talking about. Chemists have this, the everything natural is good everything synthetic is bad people, they know just enough science to sound like they know something, unless you actually know chemistry then you realize how many of their claims are ludicrous. I actually had an argument with a guy who said because aspartame and barbiturates have similar formulas (yes formulas not even structures, just similar numbers of carbons, nitrogens, hydrogens and oxygens) that they act the same in the brain. Note: I do believe there may be some validity to the aspartame claims and have met people who DID know what they are talking about who are anti-aspartame, but most do not.
OK, back on track, secondly and unfortunately, techies are viewed as a service position, not a production position. Who fixes the lighting and plumbing the systems engineers, who fixes the network, the network engineers, who fixes the computers, the computer engineer. To the board room, these positions are all viewed as more or less the same type of thing. Part of the reason for this, is the fact that technology has become so ubiquitous it has become an appliance now, which cheapens its image, turning it into a support position.