For non-Staff level SWEs, my opinion is that joining a FAANG with lower P/E is better for your future earnings.
We’ll see. I think it’s going to be hard to maintain today’s growth rate at this size.
No, because mr. Market has been looking at everything except P/E, more essentially you can't spend P/E. You spend price.
If you want to throw in P/E in the analysis fine, but then you have to throw in every other element which makes the stock move:
1) Cult CEO who is able to sell the narrative
2) Fed policy
3) Macro environment
4) Odds of company being targeted by the DOJ
and all the other trillions of factors which influences the price of a security.
As Druckenmiller reminds us: "There is not a phenomenon in the world which doesn't affect the price of a security in some shape or form, no matter how small"
In practice this means you can make good money off your hiring grant if price keeps going up, but you will also see your total comp hit a cliff / drop after a few years, since while stock going up is usually good, in Amazon's eyes, you've been lucky to be making more than your target comp those years and they aren't going to keep giving you the same amount of units if those units are worth more.