Comment by phendrenad2

Unpopular opinion: Paying more does not get you better code, or faster code, or cleaner code. It does get you valuable things, but they're unrelated to code. I'll get to that.

Some of the best all-around programmers I've met, and also the best programmers at some specific metric (rapid development, good at unraveling complex problems, good at big-picture stuff, good at architecture, good at maths/algorithms, etc.) make market rate or below market rate. Probably because they either (A) don't know their value (B) didn't go to a top CS school (C) value things other than raw income (D) aren't good at playing the political game at work (E) aren't good at self-promotion.

What paying high salaries does get you is... the widely-publicized knowledge that you pay high salaries. Sites like levels.fyi and HN will viralize this knowledge. Like your neighbor who has a shiny new BMW M3 in their driveway, you assume that they must be doing well, and must be a good investment.