Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has sparked controversy after expressing concerns that some new employees may be drawn more by high salaries than by the company's mission of "building advanced AI safely," according to Axios reports. The remark triggered widespread debate among internet users, who noted that Anthropic is currently one of the most aggressive companies in the AI industry when it comes to poaching talent, offering annual salaries of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars. Data shows that a regular machine learning engineer's annual salary usually ranges from 180,000 to 350,000 US dollars, while senior researchers at top-tier AI labs can easily exceed one million US dollars in total compensation, often including stock, options, and pre-IPO equity. Anthropic, founded by Amodei after he left OpenAI over concerns about commercialization following its partnership with Microsoft, has long emphasized its mission to develop advanced AI systems safely. However, as the company's valuation keeps climbing, this philosophy faces real-world challenges. Netizens mocked the CEO's worries, suggesting that if the mission truly mattered, salaries should be slashed to the bare minimum to see how many people would still join.