The fact of the matter is, there are still plenty of jobs available, the problem is that the variety of skills needed is insane.
I work in computers, mostly web programming. When I got out of college in 99, The job I have now paid close to 100k (as reported to me by people I work with who were here then).
Safe to say it doesn't pay that now.
Part of this has to do with the normal tugs and pulls of supply and demand, demand is lower while supply is higher, but part of it has to do with what is expected of the employee.
Granted, I can only speak to my sector of the computer industry, but right now, in order to be employed as a web developer you need to be an expert in XHTML, CSS, Javascript and XML, and you need to be proficient in either Java, .NET, C++, PHP or Perl, on top of that you need database skills.
Sufficed to say, i am studying for both my PMP and my SCJD.
The latter is actually a part of the former.
Programmers and analysts had inflated salaries ever since invention of computers --- precisely because of their shortage. Things are not bad now, they are normal (no shortage due to increased supply).
An average Electrical Engineer with a Ph.D. and 20 years of experience had a salary of $96,000 per annum in 2000. A rooky programmer that knew the laterst version of Java and a few other quirks was making over $100,000. That puts things in perspective.