"how many compiler experts have you worked with"

you meant CS PHDs? because it is a better analogy. My answer would be with many, because I am one of them.

Honest question: how common is this in tech hubs? Is the talent level that much higher? I work in the enterprise world and few people have advanced degrees.

I mean, I know there are some shops that are doing really advanced stuff, but I'm talking about your normal tech hub employer.

I don't think that people are ranked by talent. This is also true for academia. You don't have to be more talented than the next guy to show better results according to some metric. Right place + right time + avoid confrontations = a huge boost for your success.

See http://data-mining.philippe-fournier-viger.com/too-many-mach...

Roughly speaking, about 50k papers are published every year in arxiv/ML by perhaps 20k different researchers. Since some people still don't publish there, you may say there exists about 50k ML/AI/DL researchers.

Say 5k of them are pushing the field forward, most of them have a PhD. The remaining 45k deliver various local optimizations/adaptations, many of them don't have a PhD. Now it depends on the size of your normal tech hub employer. If it is big, then you have a few people from 5k and many from 45k. Otherwise, a few people from 45k.

I don't work in a tech hub but in a city with a world-leading university. Having worked for a local consultancy and a startup, I'd say over half of my colleagues have had technical PhDs and it's rare to meet people without at least a Masters. I now work for a remote company and it's probably closer to 65% with over 200 staff, but we are CS research oriented.

I'm currently studying a part-time MSc in CS because not having one is notable here (and being around academic people has inspired me to learn more).

PhD doesn't imply talent level is higher, just knowledge.

Pretty rare at your average non-tech company. Increasingly common as you get into major regional tech hubs and software as the product companies.