There are two parts to getting good employees: finding them and getting them to work for you. Many startup employees, by themselves, will not work for Yahoo for

There are two parts to getting good employees: finding them and getting them to work for you. Many startup employees, by themselves, will not work for Yahoo for $200K/year. Many startup employees will work for Yahoo for $150K/year if all their favorite coworkers are working for Yahoo and they get to work on a product they're familiar with. The only way to bring them over is to bring them over as a block. False dichotomy if there ever was one.