To be fair, I think it's pretty hard as an AI company to secure your top worker right now unless you have a significant equity compensation. Once your name is known, and you can say you are/were "top AI researcher at OpenAI/Google/Anthropic", you can probably just make you own company and raise enough money that even if the company fails, you will probably make more off of it than what you would have at your previous place of employment.
Anyone know how much these founders generally pay themselves / how much they receive in liquidity each raise?
You mean via taking secondary via subsequent rounds right? Or can they walk away with any if company flops after a giant 1st round.