Your last sentence is the best advice to give to any company in this market. My dev shop is doing just fine and I'm not paying anywhere near what I'm constantly told the "market" is. I wish I could but then I wouldn't have a business.
When my best engineers want to move on to bigger and better things I support them. It would be nice to keep them of course but I'm honest enough with myself to know that I don't need the type of engineers that can get a job at Google.
My retention rate with my "adequate" engineers is very high. Most of the ones that I know have complained about money find out that it's one thing to see jobs that pay $$$$ and another thing to actually get those jobs.
When my best engineers want to move on to bigger and better things I support them. It would be nice to keep them of course but I'm honest enough with myself to know that I don't need the type of engineers that can get a job at Google.
My retention rate with my "adequate" engineers is very high. Most of the ones that I know have complained about money find out that it's one thing to see jobs that pay $$$$ and another thing to actually get those jobs.