[cmdshiftf4]

What’s the incentive for companies to pay European devs more?

[xxpor]

Ability to attract and retain talent better than their peers?

Alternatively: What's the incentive for firms in the US to pay high wages?

[johbjo]

Managers in US software companies base their seniority on experience in software engineering. Up-valuing software engineers also up-values their own position.

Most large employers of engineers in Europe are rather old industrial companies. Management generally do not have software engineering backgrounds.

[chrisseaton]

If they could compete with American companies to get better developers they could build move valuable companies.

[matthewmacleod]

I’m pretty certain that lack of technical talent is not one of the factors contributing to the relatively fewer numbers of large European tech companies.