What you're saying is true at the bottom end of the job market, where labor is highly exchangeable. At the other side -- say a one of a kind performer, like Be

What you're saying is true at the bottom end of the job market, where labor is highly exchangeable. At the other side -- say a one of a kind performer, like Beyonce -- price gets set by an auction of gigs, where she accepts those that keep her busy and leave her with the highest margins. In between, where most of us live, neither candidates nor jobs are fully exchangeable, so both value to company and appeal to candidate (however imperfectly estimated) come into play. A hiring manager's job is to pay an employee less than the value they generate, but as much or more than they would get at a job they like just as much. Paying a Utah programmer 80 cents for what a SoMa dev gets a buck for sends the message that (a) you could pay either of them more than a dollar but (b) you could replace either of them for less than .80. Yet (c) for some reason you want them both to have the same left over after paying for their very different apartments.