[paulftw]

I think median Software Engineer Salary also followed hockey stick graph over last couple of years, as well as CA real estate prices, so it isn't that clear that Apple grew headcount at all. When iPhone came out there was no app store nor 3rd party apps; when apps arrived they had no push notifications; icloud didn't exist and so on. Products become exponentially more complex, requiring proportional growth in R&D. There may even be tax incentives to maximize R&D spending.

Smart home / smart appliances would be a much more logical step for Apple as it'd be much closer to their area of expertise in electronics. Unlike with iPod and iPhone, there's at least one company that is already doing all the right and hard things around cars - Tesla.

TVs, kitchen appliances, even lights are much better understood and researched. Technology is there, safety/regulatory barriers are lower than with cars, consumer demand is pretty obvious. Yet existing manufacturers releasing product after product with laughable design and usability. Just like used to be the case with Nokia and Windows smartphones.

[ryandrake]

Is there any actual evidence showing that median salaries are anything but stagnant recently? There may be a few outlier people at a few outlier companies experiencing "hockey stick" growth, but is this true for the median?