"In every city in the country with living-wage laws, developers claim that this will kill their project, but they're just crying wolf," Professor Dreier said.
States have been offering an escalating collection of incentives to try to attract the companies — more than 20 states now offer video game developers tax breaks to cover their wages, development and manufacturing costs.
Even more problematic than the wage rate, some developers say, is the unnecessary cost of peculiar work rules and featherbedding.
Its political campaigns are primarily waged over the air, while developers, farmers and corporations wage constant battles over the water, be they the Everglades or Florida's 1,197 miles of coastline.
These workers range from supermarket delivery people who have received an illegally low $3 an hour, far less than the $5.15 an hour minimum wage, to $100,000-a-year 100,000-a-year 100,000-a-yeara.
The median wage for a software developer is more than $90,000 a year, and new jobs are expected to grow at more than double the national average and nearly four times the state's average income.
By Labor Day, developers were waging a War of Amenities: although almost no one had reduced the astronomical prices, they had stocked the lofts with Sub-Zero refrigerators, cherry-wood floors, wine cellars and health clubs.
Developer wages in Silicon Valley are already at crazy levels.
It's still a (very) far cry from average tech developer wages in Silicon Valley, of course.
Offshoring has become less of a concern, and our own Jon Evans thinks it will be at least 10 until U.S. developer wages are driven down by international competition.
