The default should be working for a big public company that offers a big salary package. Anyone can code some cool stuff in his/her free time anyways. The startups don't generally compensate for the risks, just try to keep the best-case scenario better than multiple promotions at a big company (which is still hard)
Absolutely this. All comp evaluations should start from what you could reasonably expect (salary + annualized stock) at a public company.
Startup comp is a little different; salary + the value of equity at (a reasonable) exit (but derated by a healthy 80%, because 80% of all startups fail, right?) It might also be wise to discount for any difference in preferred shares vs. common stock.
This might just be my personal experience, but I feel like a lot of people don't derate startup equity for (the statistically expected) failure correctly.
