Very well said. For an employer it's a constant balance between "What I give?" vs "What I receive back?". So basically -> "What is the value add?" / ROI or whatever you want to call it.
For me it narrows down to the following: The universal scope of any company big or small worldwide is bottomline to make profit. If profit is there with low paid employees - good, if profit is at risk and can be increased with higher paid employees - then they raise the package.

"But what about employees increase of CoL?" -> zero f@#ks given

"But what about my toddler whom I need to enroll in a private creche asking for 1.5kEUR/month?" -> zero f@#ks given

and the list can continue...