All SWEs at the same level at Google are making the same compensation (with some exceptions for high-flying AI researchers). They Python SWEs certainly weren't making more than anyone else.
That's not true at all. (Excluding the factor of location), the compensation of a SWE depends not only the level, but also on tenure, on performance rating (and the history of rating), and on stock market fluctuations (whether the stock price was low or high when the stocks were granted).
One of the rumors is that the better compensated you are on your level, the more likely you are to be targeted for layoff, because it saves the eng cost the most.
That's the thing, it's not clear that the Python core engineers are more talented than other Google SWEs on average. You have all sorts of talented engineers working on all sorts of random projects within Google.
One of the rumors is that the better compensated you are on your level, the more likely you are to be targeted for layoff, because it saves the eng cost the most.