by the same percentage as, perhaps? Both are intensely local, and while local tech industry wages have been increasing pretty dramatically over the last decade, I think that service industry wages have stagnated, as have prices. I think the economy would be better off if we had the same degree of inflation in the service sector as we have in the tech sector.

Just my opinion, of course, and I understand it's an unpopular one.

Ultimately the wage increases would increase costs to the consumer, so it seems that you’d want to factor in the population as a whole (minus the service industry, as is the example).

TLDR; the proportion of programmers matters.