I don't think $300k is "top 1%". Maybe top 20%. I'd rate myself no better than being at the lower end of the 60th to 80th percentile: I'm slightly better than a

I don't think $300k is "top 1%". Maybe top 20%. I'd rate myself no better than being at the lower end of the 60th to 80th percentile: I'm slightly better than average, at best and on a good day. My all-in compensation is around (but more than) $200k, and I work at a relatively unknown public company with ~300 employees. I can easily get ~$50k-$100k more if I wanted to play the "code monkey interview" game simply by refreshing myself on leetcode for a bit and finally acquiescing to the recruiters from FB, Amazon and Google that ping me every so often during the year, following up with Lyft, Uber or Netflix, or even leveraging myself into a smart startup.