My point is more along the lines that I was surprised that these docs could draw that sort of salary in this particular market (and not that they don't deserve it). It was more or less along the lines that these are good, but perhaps not exceptional, docs in a market where wages are typically lower than the national norm.
EDIT:
And I'll note that I did specify specialists/surgeons for a reason. I'd expect GPs -- and most docs at my facility -- to earn significantly less than that. What I was getting at is that a specialist MD in a small market could expect to earn more than an above average developer in most markets. i.e., the doc absolutely has a harder path to their profession, but if they specialize beyond GP, they have a greater likelihood of return than your average specialist software engineer to compensate for it.
You're completely correct that the top earning physicians (mostly surgeons) can make seven figures or nearly so. I was referring only to family physicians, where $170k-$200k really is a realistic salary (even with several years of experience).
tl;dr - I suspect that there are more doctors as a percentage of that workforce earning, say, 400-500k+ than there are software engineers doing the same.
More if they're specialty and/or surgical. One of the side effects of most hospitals being organized as non-profits is that they have to disclose the compensation level of their five highest-compensated, non-board/officer employees. I know at my hospital (mid-size, 250k metro area, ~$35k median income) that number ranges from $750k-1.2M.
Granted, most doctors aren't making anywhere near that, but it was pretty surprising to me when I looked up our 990 out of curiosity. I do think an MD, especially a specialist, stands a much better chance of making that sort of money than any given software engineer, though.