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Huh? This seems like a non-sequitur. What does leaving in 2 years have to do with your worth this year? How many years would he have to stay to pay off this year?

By that logic hires are bad deals if they ever eventually leave because you "lost" the money of their last n years.

Hiring a replacement would cost them a lot of money and the replacement would also expect $400k for the same responsibilities anyway.

might have been just to avoid letting that particular skill set and experience go to a competitor. the value of that competitor getting that person was more valuable than amazon keeping him/her.

with Amazon's reputation, i imagine it's pretty difficult for them to hire and retain talent.