Yes, if you're in the Bay Area and work for Google as a mid level engineer your total compensation is at least $250k a year. Closer to 200k a year for new grads fresh out of School who have 0 experience.
Look at my other reply. This is incredibly common at the top companies in the Bay Area or any other major city (Seattle, NYC, etc).
He hasn’t said what city or even country this is in. We can’t just assume it’s a $250k + salary give the job could be in the UK, Germany, Canada and knows where else where salaries are lower in general for software engineers.
You're absolutely right. However a lot of the engineering is concentrated in a few major centers so there's a good chance he's near a major city like LA/SF/NYC/Seattle/etc
Even if the office is in a low cost of living city, the effect is similar with Google paying at the high end of the cost-adjusted band.
The point was more to illustrate that it's not just any average job and they can do things that work for them that don't work for a lot of other businesses.
Look at my other reply. This is incredibly common at the top companies in the Bay Area or any other major city (Seattle, NYC, etc).