It's always been the case that FAANG or whatever are not always the "best" home for the "best" engineers. Many do not/did not feel comfortable there, especially as they became more and more corporate and slow.

But unfortunately the answer now is that "best engineers" can't work there either because the layoff / employment-squeeze is in full swing.

You're right that the equity packages offered by startups to engineers are generally insulting. Every time this has come up in negotiation in the last few positions I've interviewed for the founders won't even tell you what % of shares they're offering, nor any sense of what the real value is, just pretend nonsense.