I'm at the point where I simply don't believe a word hiring people say about hiring anymore. I have 20 years of experience at world-class companies, and have shipped multiple very well known products that have collectively sold ~150 million copies. I've had nothing but stellar performance reviews and LinkedIn recs. Coworkers and managers have told me often that I'm one of the best devs they've had the pleasure of working with, and I believe they meant it. I'm very comfortable with every major OS and language, and every stack level.

Nobody is going to pay me $500K. Nobody is going to pay me $200K. As recently as 2015, I still had well-known companies trying as hard as they could to bring me on at under $100K! The last time I talked to an SV company publicly claiming to offer $250K, it turned out they were reserving the "top end" for imaginary devs. My work experience only weighed in at $150, according to them. Also, despite having a very rare combination of two unrelated specialties (the reason I applied), and being proficient in 6 languages, including JS, they passed because they felt my JS experience was too light. Writing the AJAX and UI framework used by a team of 30, and working on the front end of a major portal, both at BigCo, were apparently too small-time.

My whole career in the industry I was aggressively low-balled 9 times out of 10. Hiring people can't hire who they want, because they're scheming double-talkers, and they've convinced themselves that it's just good business. I started a small business that pays the bills, and I've never been happier. I sincerely would not go back to the industry even if you did pay me $500K.