Agreed. I got an offer from a YC company about a year ago. The offer was lower than I currently make by a large margin. I tried to negotiate, and the CEO came back in a huff and basically said I was an idiot for turning down the job, and why do I even bother with startups in the first place if I want so much money? Well, that's the thing, dude. I don't need your job. You need me. You got the whole thing backwards.
Anyway, yeah, I agree with you completely.
(And by the way, keep pushing on the unit test thing. It's something worth arguing for. Or next time, build in unit tests into the project estimate instead of setting it aside as a separate project. Good luck.)
But they were offering you to change the world dude! Like social and big data and cloud!
This issue was discussed quite a lot on HN over past couple of years. Not sure what those so called CEOs are thinking but it's their lose.
There must be some significant personal benefit for me, above money, that I would consider an offer like that. Influential position in a startup working in an area which I find exciting and proof that founders know what they are doing? Yeah something like that.
I mean, if he'd met me halfway, I probably would have taken the offer. But he didn't. He just basically told me to fuck off. I'm not really sure why he didn't expect negotiation. Maybe I negotiated badly. Sadly, if he'd been polite and said something along the lines of "We just can't afford that salary level. I'm sorry we couldn't work things out," then maybe in a year, when I'm out of a job for whatever reason, I might be willing to come back and take that offer, or at least entertain a new one. But no, he burned that bridge. Either way, I think I dodged a bullet.
But you're right. If he'd made me CTO or some other personal benefit, I would have taken the offer in a heartbeat. For a regular dev salary with regular dev equity, it just wasn't enough. Plus, I already get equity at my current publicly-traded company, which means my equity is worth actual cash. I dunno. The whole thing annoyed me.
They're a YC company and got another round of funding a few months ago, so I imagine they're still around and doing okay. The same job listings are still on their website. Not sure if they've filled any of them or not. shrug
I don't have much faith that they'll do well, but I'm not a VC for a reason, so.. :)
Anyway, yeah, I agree with you completely.
(And by the way, keep pushing on the unit test thing. It's something worth arguing for. Or next time, build in unit tests into the project estimate instead of setting it aside as a separate project. Good luck.)