After my first proper full-time job, every single position I've taken was based on being interested in working on the product. I've taken pay cuts, changed rol

After my first proper full-time job, every single position I've taken was based on being interested in working on the product. I've taken pay cuts, changed roles from engineering to product management, and in the future may change back to engineering (I keep my chops up). At no point have I ever taken a job because of the pay, and I don't see that ever changing. I think many people are like this. So, my advice is that you should focus on having a compelling and interesting product. If you have this, you can hire high-quality people for a reasonable rate of pay. I'm still invested in my current role, but now I often get reached out to by recruiters looking for early hires for new startups where I know I'd mostly be taking equity not pay, and I'm in a position where I can afford to do that. That's likely what I'll end up doing in my next role. Nobody wants to work on boring stuff. Boring stuff is just a fact of life that we all have to do some of the time. But the main thing is, to make sure that the product is compelling and interesting enough to make the boring stuff worthwhile when it happens in between the bouts of interesting stuff. If a job is just non-stop boring stuff and bureaucracy at a high rate of pay, people who are longer in tooth are going to leave and you're going to have brain drain.