I get what you're saying but that's when we talk about averages and generalizations. It doesn't necessarily apply to an individual. For example, the average l

I get what you're saying but that's when we talk about averages and generalizations. It doesn't necessarily apply to an individual. For example, the average lawyer makes about 120k a year. A really good lawyer with a great local (and perhaps state-wide or country-wide) reputation will charge a lot more for their time since their time is a limited commodity. It doesn't matter that the average lawyer can still only charge ~120k per year. They can personally charge much more than that so the supply and demand aspect of the market a whole is meaningless to them specifically. Similarly, if this programmer/developer has a ton of skills and experience and can crank out code, they can conceivably charge a lot more for their time.