[woolvalley]

I think this is a relatively recent development. 8-10 years ago, working at a startup or working at FANG paid about the same, but the startup came with this lottery ticket, you learned more at a startup and it wasn't a big co with big co politics and process. Back then it definitely made a lot more sense to maybe give up %10-%20 less income in exchange.

Startups & VCs started getting a lot of money in the global search for yield as interest rates dropped to 0 and QE started printing money and giving it to banks who would invest it. The google/apple/etc wage collusion lawsuit increased the amount of competition for engineers. FANG was losing engineers who would rather do their own thing for a little bit less. The H1B lottery system limited the supply. Housing started getting even more expensive in the SFBA. And as you said, FANG prints money so they can afford to keep on going up in the bidding wars.

Compensation started going up in this competitive system as a result until we are at the point we are today, where startups are definitely not competitive comp wise to being at FANG.