I think if you want to argue to specific people that they should join your nascent cooperative on the basis that it will pay just as well, you should be prepare

I think if you want to argue to specific people that they should join your nascent cooperative on the basis that it will pay just as well, you should be prepared to have some way to back that up for the particular workers you're trying to recruit. If that's the infinitely small minority of software workers in question, then that's the wage you have to meet. This is an apples to apples comparison because it was set up that way from the start. If you want to argue they should take a pay cut to do something morally superior, then you should argue this instead of claiming equivalent pay is readily achievable. This is not a general position about how all or even any significant portion of labor should be organized. This is a specific comment, offered narrowly in a particular and rather unusual situation. You seem to be treating me as someone who opposes cooperatives. This is amusingly far from correct. My objections here are not anti-cooperative, they are practical objections to the contradictions in the plan of someone I would like to see succeed.