As an experienced engineer, making at least 2x the salary of a fresh grad, am I worth it? Yes, in fact I'd sort of describe that as a killer deal. Turn the question around: could my company lay me off, take my salary, hire 2 interns and get as much or more done? Hell no. There is no number of interns that could replace me. Even if you could find 2 interns that could match my productivity in terms of lines of code, you'd still need a master-craftsman system designer, like myself, to manage them and actually get a cohesive product at the end. And on a fixed schedule, don't get me started...