Bad rep?

I don't know if this has been covered before, but it seems to me that
PHP, despite its widespread use, is very much considered to be a
"Cinderella" of the modern programming languages.

How do I know this? Well, looking at the job market in the UK, it seems
that most, if not all, the people looking for PHP skills (a small, but
increasing, number) rate the value of those skills at something
considerably less than basic HTML coding. In fact, if you went for a PHP
job, you'd probably get better paid for making the tea...

Certainly, the disparity between the perceived value of PHP skills and
things like Perl, Java, JSP, etc., is absolutely vast. This applies in
all sizes of business.

I find this disconcerting because, as a programmer of some 30 years
experience, I've adopted PHP in preference to Perl, which I find
inelegant and quirky, and have used it increasingly in place of Shell
and C, both of which I consider myself to be above average at coding.

I'd like to think that, in adopting a language for preference, I wasn't
being completely daft, that my reasoning was sound and based on the
qualities that I see in that language.

Is there someone out there who's taking note of how PHP is perceived?
Am I wrong in my assessments?
What can be done, if I'm right?

Regards

Graham