It's all about leverage - regardless of if you're a brilliant engineer, you can't have the same impact coding vs exerting soft power on the business to architec

It's all about leverage - regardless of if you're a brilliant engineer, you can't have the same impact coding vs exerting soft power on the business to architect a system in the optimal way. And most companies want the brilliant engineers to be the ones making those decisions, hence the pay incentives guiding the brightest towards that direction.