It's a straightforward comparison in the area. Below Principal/Staff, Microsoft's stock awards are a (very unfunny) joke and their comp is pretty meh.
I left in 2018. I was 63 (first level senior) and had offers from Google and Meta for a downlevel (L4) at a 40% increase in total comp. The gap has closed slightly in the last 7 years but not much at those levels.
Same experience for me, I still remember at IC1 getting 7k stocks over 5 years as my "stock bonus" for the year. which meant getting 1 or 2 MSFT stock every 4 months :D
