Equity is not proportional to salary. Perhaps only after you control for "time-to-join", andwhether you are a founder/investor/employee, but definitely not without that.
On another note, there's something about a disparity on ownership and %founders that seems more profound than the salary IMO (with the caveat that it is hard to study this controlling for the right things).
I think it's an honest comment about the "Halo-effect" the YC stamp can have on investors.
One useful counterfactual is thinking about what our comments would be if Sam said "more YC company should raise money immediately after the program". I think it would be very hard to defend that every (most?) startup is ready for such a commitment at that very specific moment in time.
So they would have to invest their pennies :)