It's hard making this point if you don't have access to capital, but if the talent is comparable, doesn't this represent an opportunity to go after an idea with above-average talent through simply paying globally-optimal market rates and pricing out the competition for talent?

It seems that there's an opportunity here to incubate ideas at a discount globally by "overpaying" locally.

Are there VC funds that are exploiting this? And I don't mean simply by making margin on the back of exploiting the CoL adjustments, but by drawing on regional talent pools with lower CoLs? I'm shocked there isn't more innovation coming from the upper midwest hub that lies along the belt connecting UICU, Purdue, CMU, etc.