i dont meant to come across as too harsh, but that is something that you will have to figure out. if companies are less inclined to give salaries for technical skills, then its on us to figure out how our current skill sets become marketable.

even the job of freelance engineer is customer relation. how good are you at extracting product requirements? understanding a clients workflows? these take relational skills and are often what freelancers are paid for, beyond the ability to produce code.