[david_shaw]

It's a valid business strategy to hire the best and brightest in the field, and to pay higher than average to attract that talent -- if you can afford it.

"Big law" firms are a good example of this too: they pay way more than some random family law practice.

[xboxnolifes]

The "if you can afford it" is pulling all the weight there. Why can certain companies afford it more than others in the same market? The context of this thread is suggesting that those companies are doing more crime or crime-adjacent activities.

[david_shaw]

Sure, I understand the thread's implication and I'm certainly not saying that it's never true.

But some companies have the choice of hiring, for example, one really great engineer for $500k, and one very solid one for $250k.

Another organization might want to hire three engineers for $250k.

A third, perhaps, wants to hire seven at $100k.

They're all spending the same amount of money, but not every company can "afford" that spend -- especially if they need several engineers working on unique feature sets.

I just think it's a leap to say that every company paying more than average market value is criminal.

[tyre]

Yes and what do large, white shoe law firms work on primarily? The largest clients are the ones with lots of…legal activity.

What types of clients might those be?