> [P]eople complain they are not compensated enough relative to the importance of their work, their intelligence, the hours put in, their title or the length of their education or the risk they take.

Most developers would be wise to understand that with few exceptions, none of these things have anything to do with your compensation. Your compensation is based almost entirely on some amorphous combination of:

  A) Supply of similarly skilled labor (if enough similarly skilled devs are happy to do the work for $80k that gives you a ceiling)
  B) Supply of less skilled labor (if an army of unskilled devs are happy to do the work for $8/hr ...)
  C) Your leverage over your [prospective] employer
  D) How the company has done over the last *n* quarters
  E) Patronage
  F) Nepotism
  G) Luck

I know I'm just repeating most of what you said.