To be fair, from the tech workers' point of view, it doesn't much matter whether the employer is technically a tech company (Google), a hardware manufacturer (Apple), or a retailer/cloud provider (Amazon). So long as you're getting paid top-bucks in the industry for doing software engineering, which is possible at all of them, then you're golden.
Facebook, Google, and Netflix are known to make better offers than Apple and Amazon (although those two are capable of great offers and have both employed thousands of engineers who became millionaires after stock appreciation).
Amazon entry level software engineer in Seattle starts at over 100k and senior goes way up from there. Particularly with the stock gains of AMZN, engineers are highly compensated.
Not compared to FNG. A big reason for this discrepancy is enforceable noncompetes in Washington. In California, poaching is always fair game, so employers that compete on compensation have to pay accordingly.
If you come from Amazon, Facebook will make an offer accordingly. If you have competing offers from NG, you will get a significant bump during salary negotiation. My sources are offers from these companies for multiple engineers.
