You forgot the middleground where there are thousands of laid off people who can do your exact job and undercut you etc.

These founders hire/fire through hundreds of us, they don't give a shit.

If you say 1 thing they don't like they go to the next.

That's not the middle ground. That's the other extreme, where people are desperate for work so they will say they can do anything in order to get work.

How many of those people have experience with augmented reality? Probably not that many.

$35k seems pretty low for this job. Hindsight is 20/20 of course.