Totally. To back this up with a real world example, Apple screwed up the throttling of the i9 MacBooks originally, causing them to be over throttled. A software update that pretty much amounted to an MSR write on boot fixed it.
https://www.macrumors.com/2018/07/24/throttling-fix-2018-mac...
Why does Intel let OEMs play with that? It's to give OEMs a knob they can play with to balance perf and price for their segment. It lets OEMs cheap out on cooling (or go with new form factors like the tiny GPD models) and go with the low minimums, or have a full system that's capable of higher TDP like Apple's tend to be.
Macbook Air has extremely bad cooling (on purpose, because it's thin and quiet). Don't expect it to boost well.
"Boost well" probably means different things to different people.
On my fanless 12" MB with a 7W TDP m7-6Y75 (1.3 Ghz base, 3.1 GHz max turbo), running a Prime95 torture test stabilizes at the following for the CPU via Intel Power Gadget: 9.5W, 1.95 GHz, 90°. (Laptop feels warm to the touch - it only ever feels "hot" under GPU load.) Normal all-thread load stabilizes around 2.5 GHz.
OEMs can still control load performance, it's not entirely determined by TDP.
Anandtech has a good article: https://www.anandtech.com/show/13544/why-intel-processors-dr...
Depending on OEM settings and cooling capacity, it's possible for Intel CPUs to indefinitely run at greater than their base clocks and TDP.