It sounds like what you're saying is actually that the last engineer was being paid above-market, because the price that employers are paying new employees is literally the market rate, seeing as it's the rate in the literal market.
I want to drill this into anyone that throws the word "below market" or "above market" around.
If a company pays below-market, it won't be able to hire anyone. Either the role will remain unfilled, or the employer will have to compromise on experience.
If someone is claiming to be paid below-market but the company can hire their replacement, then they're not being truthful.
You could be an AI infra genius, but if you're in a cookie-cutter consultancy role, that's the salary you're getting.
It’s a lemon market with a power play dynamic, one of the main reasons I’m self employed.
Will you be able to find someone in this economy? Sure
Could you fill the shoes? Much harder. Especially in the age of bootcamps, AI to complete exercises, and what have you where people went into IT for the money and not for the love of the craft, tinkering and learning.
So this is not an oxymoron: you can have 200 applicants and not a single good one to replace someone with them.
My current manager has been with the company for almost 20 years. He doesn't feel the need to leave because his stock options have made him a multimillionaire. The company doesn't care about him or me, but we're both happy to stay because we don't need them to. We just need them to pay us.
Or they lobby the government for slaves
Market rate for developers has either stagnated generally or depending on the role dropped as hundreds of applicants are willing to undercut each other on what constitutes an acceptable pay check.
But most employers don't go around reducing previously-hired people's salaries for a variety of reasons.
The main reason being that it's illegal in NZ. The employee would have to agree.