Hah. I worked for that startup before I moved to Chicago. I suspect that doing SV style startups is something that is hard to do outside of SV and as it gets "taught" in B-schools around the world more and more people will try to emulate it poorly.
Maybe I run in the wrong circles, but developer compensation is actually slightly elevated due to the trading houses. This is cyclic to some degree but when trading houses are flush they tend to be able to just come over the top of other businesses (and they have a culture of doing so). I think that also depresses the value of "equity" compensation. Lots and lots of developers in Chicago actually know how options work (how to price them etc) and are weaned on a diet of cash bonuses. It makes equity packages unattractive to that class of developer. Maybe that has a trickle down effect that causes equity to not be a major compensation component?
Maybe I run in the wrong circles, but developer compensation is actually slightly elevated due to the trading houses. This is cyclic to some degree but when trading houses are flush they tend to be able to just come over the top of other businesses (and they have a culture of doing so). I think that also depresses the value of "equity" compensation. Lots and lots of developers in Chicago actually know how options work (how to price them etc) and are weaned on a diet of cash bonuses. It makes equity packages unattractive to that class of developer. Maybe that has a trickle down effect that causes equity to not be a major compensation component?