Or maybe the job their trying to fill isn't worth that much to them (the employers, that is)?
As an example, let's take a speech-writer for a presidential candidate.
Company X (let's say it has 100 billion in the bank) wants a website, so it looks for an SEO firm, but it's cheap and not interested in investing in the website.
X doesn't get skilled SEO consultants.
X now has three choices - get minimum quality workers, drop the website project or pay more for better workers.
Obviously, workers would prefer if X choses 3, but there are times when it just doesn't make sense to do so (or the company doesn't _think_ it needs to do so, and goes out of business):
What if a company has a small audience comprised of people who don't find things online.
Let's say the company runs a program only senators would use. That's a hundred person market which practically requires personal connection to their staff to make a deal.
Hiring someone for $250,000 website is just not worth it.
Practically, in a capitalist environment, workers are "contractors" selling themselves.
The same way I would not pay for a big-iron computer when all I need is a laptop, companies don't want to pay $200,000 when they can find someone for less.