Happiness is not enough! I demand constant euphoria!

Their managers earning as much or more don't lol

haha their managers' job is just redefining expectations of what is required.

A L9 manager has a very different job. That's a VP and they've probably got 500 people under them. Very high level ICs are also somewhat often directly managed by lower level managers (who are also paid much less). It isn't terribly uncommon to see an L8 managed by a L7.

Managing 500 people is a far lower responsibility than "redefine the entire industry". The entire industry is probably a hundred thousand workers and dozens of companies making hundreds of billions of dollars and you have to completely change the game for all of them. Why should someone who only manages a mere 500 people get more than one thousandth of the compensation? They probably only have a dozen direct reports anyway.

That's just a reflection of the fact that it's much easier to have a big impact if you direct an entire org to make it happen rather than trying to be a hero and doing it all individually.

We already know that part. They take credit for other people's work and they will fire you if you don't earn them a big payday.