Also, those highly paid engineers in other companies might be tired of working on surveillance tech but aren't willing to stomach 50% pay cuts because your company is shooting for "market rate" compensation instead of market clearing compensation.
One way is to try switching from a regular industry job to a “giant” such as a FAANG. But these are quite rare in most countries.
Another way would be switching into specific industries like finance - but the high comp there traditionally means giving up some other things such as a guaranteed 40h-or-less workweek. Hard pass from many established engineers.
A third option would be switching to a larger share of non cash comp, but again, equity large bonuses are not commonly part of European comp and comp in traditional industry.
That's cuz your numbers are too small. Offer a 50% raise instead of a 20k raise and you will see different results.
> Yes I could quit and get a ~20k raise by shopping my resume around, but I don't need the money
Plenty of stories on Blind of people shopping around and going from 150k TC to 350k TC, so I guess it really depends on your situation.