[dzonga]

You hit the nail on the head. Big tech pays more as a form to supress competition. With high wages, it's easier for someone to lose motivation and not pursue their idea. which would increase to competition at the lower level. but as we know, the lower level competitors gather up, and not long after gather enough momentum to attack the big guys. the other way, big tech supresses innovation is by brain-washing or propaganda. look at all the companies formed by former faang engineers. majority of them go for vc-funding, use complicated tools at the onset. not because it's a need but because that's what they're used to. what would've been a simple frontend is now a monorepo monster, a simple backend a mesh of microservices. lastly, big tech supresses competition by open sourcing tools that are technically excellent but not needed by 90% of the companies out there. instead of companies innovating the companies are now chasing the platform i.e trying to keep up with the tools released by big tech. this is a microsoft playbook. and to ya other point, for the second sector - compensation can easily go up if engineers stop fucking around and start producing. if you're actually producing and the owner sees you as important, unless a foolish owner they will give you a piece of the pie.