Maybe if someone is doing shotty analysis or is a narcissist. It's unlikely anyone knows what their peers are making without estimates relative to the median. I

Maybe if someone is doing shotty analysis or is a narcissist. It's unlikely anyone knows what their peers are making without estimates relative to the median. It's also unlikely someone can even self-evaluate accurately without employment/comp data. Even something like levels.fyi doesnt go into actual attributes but basically what level someone is at a company. As an example, how does the defined benefits package in the military compare with the 401k model, especially considering for someone leaving the military and getting into the 401k model late (reduced compounding)? In many cases, a rational person in that sort of situation may see that the lower pay might not actually result in lower total compensation. The real point is that you can still pull competent professionals under $200k because that's an attractive number to the majority of cyber warfare operators or cyber security professionals being that it's at least $50k over the median for either. Reducing that to $150k is still somewhat to slightly over the medians for either, and thus still a financially attractive number to the majority of the candidate pool. Money isn't the real issue here, it's the other restrictions, culture, etc.