This.

Companies following consultant reports will usually end up offering 50% ranges, which for SRE/SIE roles in major metros comes to around $163k. If they study BLS/FRED/CPI data and aim to pay someone enough for a 50/30/20 budget in a major metro at median rent, they’ll offer $175k to $200k+. If they want someone to stick around, buy an average home, lay roots, it’s $210k+, minimum.

“Six figures” doesn’t cover essentials anymore for almost every major city in the USA, and the last thing you can afford to cheap out on is the labor supporting your IT infra. Every corner you cut today on TC (outsourcing, offshoring, consulting) is just letting fires rage until you either parachute out or everything burns down, and that’s not a game you can afford to play with critical business technologies.