Speaking as an employee of one of the big cos, the engineers who get paid $100k base vs $140 base have lower expectations of performance attached to their work.
New grads at Amazon, FB, Google etc have about the same responsibilities. The only thing that affects pay significantly is other offers for matching, education (sometimes Masters/PhD get more) and location (+10% in more expensive areas for Amazon, slight COLA adjustments at Google. None at FB though). Otherwise the bands and responsibilities are fairly consistent.
If anything, since Amazon engineers are expected to be on call for the same things that Google hires SREs to handle, I'll be doing more.
If anything, since Amazon engineers are expected to be on call for the same things that Google hires SREs to handle, I'll be doing more.