This is interesting, but the take also seems to miss in several points, for me. The main thing that has happened since the author entered the idustry is the shiftover from web pages to web applications. This has had knock on effects across the industry.
Whats the difference, you ask? A web page is a mostly static and mostly stateless program. It is made of html, enhanced through javascript. A web app is a regular application, delivered to the platform of the web. It is written in javastcript and produces html. It is often very stateful. It is very dynamic.
Jquery, probably the most powerful tool for enhancing websites, was released in 2006. This was the height of website design, as the webdesigner could create the structure in html and then modify it with jquery. It was a blend of design and technical application. Its no surprise that the big social media all dates from around this time. Social media is a mostly static experience that jquery made very delightful.
React was released in 2013. This was the first major framework to be javascript-first. The layout and structure of the page took place entirely in javascript. It was no longer a blend of skills, creating the page was a fully programing job. This brought web more into the traditional software industry, with all that that entails. It also enabled web design applications, such as Squarespace, which further deminished web design as a practice.
I started in the industry in 2008. In my experiance, there was never a strong representation of women in web design. This got worse asthings shifted, but its a mischaracterization, I think, to say that women were pushed out. Its also a mischaracerization to talk about the creation ofthe front end developer role or the ux role. These roles have always existed (or, at least, existed since before the time period we are talking about). These are application development roles. Windows and Mac apps had ux designers and front end developers already. When those same companies decided to usethe browser as their platform rather than the desktop, it was natural to transfer those same roles.
If anything, it seems, the period of web design was the oddity as industry norms just weren’t available in the less powerful browsers of the time.