Paying top rates is associated with more successful companies because the more successful companies have the money to pay top rates. That doesn't mean they get

Paying top rates is associated with more successful companies because the more successful companies have the money to pay top rates. That doesn't mean they get the "best" people, though. I know good developers who have joined Google, ended up on things where they weren't learning much, and left Google for things that were more challenging. And I've known people who hopped between the various high-profile companies regularly to maximize salary. They were all smart enough, but they aren't people I'd want on my team because what they focused on wasn't the work or the colleagues, but getting the next promotion so they'd look more appealing next time they changed jobs. Or you could look at the people in finance. I used to write software for financial traders. It was lucrative but soulless and frequently unpleasant. Some of the people I was building for were awful human beings. I left, and few of my former colleagues stayed in the industry. So in my view, finance pays more because to compensate for its flaws. So I'd agree that on average a better software developer can command more pay than a worse one. But so can people who are more self-confident, more self-promoting, more exploitative, or less interested in things like net value to society, learning things, or working with good people. There are just too many factors to make sweeping statements, especially at the extremes.