[st3v3r]

"That's not what happened here. No "10x developer" was hired. It was literally just a huge pay raise for the newest employees, and shafting the ones that had been there for years."

No, it wasn't. There was no "shafting" involved. Phrasing it that way shows that you're just as petty and jealous as those others. Someone else getting paid well does not take away from your worth.

"It turned from a merit-based system"

Payroll has almost never been a merit-based system, so any arguments about that are deeply flawed.