I don't think this is disputed that the original goal of SQL was a flop. The designers grossly underestimated the technical chops of a layman. However, I would argue that us tech people did benefit from that original goal of simplicity. I mean, SELECT first, last FROM employees WHERE id = 10 is not too bad at all. Kind of elegant, no?

If SQL was designed "by engineers for engineers", you would be using esoteric Git commands just to blow off steam.