>Microsoft's compensation for early career is competitive with Google and Meta (at least for the first couple of years; Meta will grow your level faster and Google gives better annual RSU refreshers

It's not. Microsoft's stock grants are a joke. I left Microsoft after 8 years with ~36k in unvested stock (vesting over 4-5 years) and a title of Senior (L63). Both Google and Meta offered me a downlevel (L4) for a 40% increase in total comp and with annual stock refreshers significantly larger than 5 years worth of stock grants at MSFT.

Microsoft starts to become competitive around Principal/Staff, sort of, but from a compensation perspective working at them at a junior/midlevel/senior level is a huge mistake.