I think this Could be an eu thing. I've moved to Berlin and while wages here are cheaper than the rest of Germany I still see a lot of companies looking for senior guys who think paying 55k is asking a lot. They really start going what when I'm asking for 65k€. All while paying other departments ok. Like one company I seen them paying 40-50k for their devs while paying 40k to a finance assistant (literally the person they loan out to other department to do ask people to sign forms and stuff.)
Whilst not quite at the 45k level, I'm on more in marketing in London than I would be doing RoR work at a similar experience level. Probably better career progression and increases on the developer side though.
Think it's partly because there are very few specific dev shops, and most of the roles are in-house where development is a support activity rather than the meat.
It's just programming in general in UK, isn't that highly paid.