Is it an overall trend or like the peterme.com link, a SF/ Silicon Valley tech money trend?
If it’s caused by the growth in design work to make internal hiring more economical (especially with cashed up tech companies) overall it’s good for the industry.
(speaking of, the word “design” is auto corrected to “Design” in my Android powered phone, if it gets autocorrected to “$$$ Design $$$!!!” then my hypothesis will be proven)