I was brought on at a large tech company as a lead engineer / manager at a competitive compensation. After several months in the position, I'm in a 1:1 with my boss, a director. I'm advocating for the team by saying that inflation has really started to take a toll on them (every single teammate brought it up with me individually), and the entire team is grossly underpaid compared to industry standards – which is crazy, because these people are phenomenally talented and would have no problems finding a new role with pay commensurate with industry (they should be earning 50% to 60% more). I suggest an adjustment, extra stock, special bonuses, etc. The director acknowledged the situation, saying that new employees are being given a competitive package, but existing employees are lagging behind. And in a quieter voice, the director mentioned “we have leverage over the foreign employees (L1 visa, tied with specific company) so we can keep their pay lower.” The director then said that funding wasn't available to increase base pay, but maybe we can dole out $100 gift cards for special effort rewards. And in the next breath, I'm told we have 15 new open reqs to hire.