As another commenter is saying, though, there's a big difference between what most companies pay and what are the visible offers in the market.

Offers at or above the average rate appear, get filled, and disappear. Unrealistic offers below the market rate stay "on marked" for a long, long time - so if you're looking at "what's on offer today" you're seeing a very different list of numbers from the actual prices at which deals are getting closed.

It's same as in stock market - the 'market price' is the average of closed deals, but the visible company job offers is the equivalent of outstanding 'ASK' bids which are not really representative of market price.

Think in terms of offers. You looked for jobs and you had multiple offers at ¤10, ¤11, ¤12, ¤15 (you may have more options with more numbers if you keep looking).

You took the job at 15 => Your market rate is 15, all the other companies didn't pay market rate.

Usually, your market rate is the best you got. There aren't many "best" by definition.

Assuming that the ¤10 company failed to recruit but ¤11 and ¤12 companies did manage to get a fitting candidate at that price, the market rate for that position is ~¤13, as that is the average rate at which the deals are happening - yes, offers that don't result in deals aren't relevant to the market rate, but at the same time someone asking for a raise to ¤15 and not getting it also isn't relevant to the market rate.

I'd say it's the profile that is 15. The market rate is defined for a specific profile, not for a generic job ad.

The 11 and 12 accepted offers were for other people, that maybe couldn't get better than 11 and 12. Maybe they are less experienced? maybe the 15 company would have hired them both too... but only at 11?

We could say that the cheap companies are under market or that they're only in the market for junior level <profile> (even though they don't advertise it).

We both agree we have to look at the closed deals and the details of the deals =)