I'm just a midwesterner, but I'd say it all depends. Some startups just don't have the money to throw around where they can list a position over 150k. For com

I'm just a midwesterner, but I'd say it all depends. Some startups just don't have the money to throw around where they can list a position over 150k. For companies that do have that money, they change the title - I do a lot of DevOps but I am a Solution Architect. Some companies have Platform Architect role(s). Edit: and everyone needs experienced Site Reliability Engineers For many non-tech companies, in-house salaries might be pegged low but then they hire contractors which can command high rates, perhaps billing as much as $200/hr (granted, a cut comes out of that). Also these contractors can conceivably be handling more than 1 client.