Agree with you there. I have some friends that do the kinda dev I feel is radioactive, but then they tell me about their benefits and wages and I'm like "where's the hazmat suit?"
some benefits are hard to quantify and/or equate to $. For example, each person would value commute time differently, but how many people actually compute the cost of a longer commute beyond just gas and time? What about its effect on your health and mental state? Sometimes we neglect/forget to take these things into account, but sometimes it's just hard to factor them in altogether...
I think a lot of programmers don't realize how much some other programmers get paid once you factor in other incentives outside of salary.