And that's a big deal.

But if the cost of an employee is > their value, you get massive off-shoring. That's the danger, and as an Australian the opportunity, of Bay Area pricing being so crazy.

If the Bay Area wants to keep its advantage - in a world where Alibaba is the lead IPO of the last 5 years - it needs to remain competitive in all ways.

Rome wasn't built in a day, but it fell in one.

No need to 'off-shore'. Presumably companies in the Bay area could start (or grow) branch offices in other places in the US that don't have such a high cost of living.

It may be that the cost to attract talent to the Bay area is now too high for all but the most profitable businesses. I have no idea if this is true or not but conceptually the giant payrolls needed may finally be overwhelming the benefits of locating a company in the area.

Please explain how offering $200k will keep those incompetent guys from applying. I don't see how your "solution" changes anything

The complaint "I can't differentiate competent applicants from incompetent ones" is a very different one than "I'm not getting any competent applicants". Offering a higher salary incentivizes more competent applicants to apply.

$200k doesn't stop incompetents from applying. It does, however, tempt competent people to add themselves to the running.