Stone cold, unapologetic capitalist here. I had never questioned that line of thinking until this minute. And,uh… I agree completely! It can’t be a coincidence that Tom and the rest of the Blender people are doing such a spectacular job.
Thankfully for the Blender Foundation this is less likely to be an issue, since based on the data they appear to largely employ people in countries that have a healthy social safety net. If expenses like health care don't come directly out of the employee's pocket you can pay lower salaries no problem.
Personally as an American with health issues, I could never consider a job at that salary, no matter how much I wanted the job. Maybe if it came with a work visa so I could live in another country with functioning social and health services (but in some cases, non-citizens pay for that out of pocket).
The future of organizations like this sure seems to be distributed, so global talent recruitment should be a real advantage.