Comment by fzeroracer

The issue isn't lack of compensation necessarily, it's lack of societal support.

Here in America I cannot work on OSS because if I tried to make that my main form of contribution, I would not survive due to healthcare costs, living costs etc. Companies being made to pay more or subsidize OSS I believe would have a detrimental effect on the system, because then it warps OSS to serve the desires of big companies in order for its contributors to survive.

The actual solution to this problem would be things like socialized healthcare detached from work. This isn't to say I think companies shouldn't pay for OSS (they absolutely should be funding and contributing to work that underpins their software) but rather that we need to reduce the reliance on corporate funding for people to be full time contributors.