Agreed, having recently gone from a startup job to a government/university one it's like a large boulder of stress is suddenly gone. Being in that original mindset it's genuinely alien to see a workspace without a slack and kanban board, but also unimaginably freeing. There's more trust and people still get things done on time regardless, emails and impromptu in person chat works just fine. People genuinely living life instead of being on a capitalistic ass grindset. I've lost count the number of times I've seen the startup founder neglect family stuff to make the latest deal or sale or whatever that inevitably fell through anyway lmao, and naturally dragging the rest of the team into the mess at weird hours.
As you say the downside is indeed pay, but as long as it's livable it's still an acceptable tradeoff.