This happened at a company that I worked at previously. All of the "good programmers" left to more honest and less stressful workplaces because they could. This

This happened at a company that I worked at previously. All of the "good programmers" left to more honest and less stressful workplaces because they could. This left only average programmers remaining. Without the good programmers to mentor the remainders, people started to fall into bad habits and started slipping into "below average" territory.