[metric10]

I don't think Google is operating at a total loss when they pay a developers these salaries? Software is making Google (and many other tech companies) hundreds of billions per year in profit and people are complaining about a 6 figure salary being too high.

If all I can afford to pay a developer is minimum wage, is he or she now obligated to work for me at my "market rate?" At what point does it go from not having enough money to afford a highly qualified developer to becoming "poaching?"

ed: Toned it down a little. I think tech is making an absurd amount of money and it's exasperating to see people complain about paying their workers too much.

[Leherenn]

I don't think people are complaining workers are paid too much, but that some markets are distorted by external forces.

Let's say you're a company in a field, competing against other companies in that same field. Everyone is basing wages on how much money they expect to make and so on. Not everyone has the same estimations, but in the end they're all grounded in that market.

Now comes a company with virtually limitless from some other market, who doesn't care about making money but about achieving dominance. All of the sudden, they're throwing wages around you can't compete with because they're not trying to be profitable.

[metric10]

Google is not operating at a loss, however. They are not paying people exorbitant salaries to keep them from working at smaller companies. They are paying them six figure salaries and making _billions_ doing it. Google seems to very much care about making money. Six figures seems small to me, if anything.

Did I miss something?

[johncolanduoni]

Alphabet’s revenue isn’t even multiple hundreds of billions (it was $161 billion last year). Their profit is “only” in the tens of billions range.