Did they really EARN it?

[WhiteCrow]

I'm not quite sure where this should go but since it has something to do with worker's struggles I'll leave it here. Though I'm sure this has been said before.

So, the common argument against increased taxation on the rich is "Don't they deserve the money that they earned?" and the common rebuttal is that there is only so much money that a person can spend. But my question is: Did they really earn that money?

Working directly under the CFO of a company, I realised that we were doing almost the same work. We pushed pencils, organised Excel tables, and used InDesign to fix the catalog. The only difference is that I was working for $10 an hour and he was working for $130,000 a year.

I worked 40-50 hours a week so I'll calculate that as 45 for brevity. So $10*45 hours*52 weeks is $23,400 a year for a similar job description. You could argue that since he made major decisions for the company he deserves compensation for it, and I'd grant that. However, most of the data that he presented to the Board was from my Excel folder.

Now, I come here not to ***** about my job, but to illustrate my point; he did not earn his salary, we both did. So to argue that he does not deserve to be taxed more because "he earned it" completely ignores the value of the work put forth by his subordinates.

[ckaihatsu]

You could argue that since he made major decisions for the company he deserves compensation for it, and I'd grant that. However, most of the data that he presented to the Board was from my Excel folder.


The argument for greatly enhanced executive compensation basically derives from their having to 'take risks' and 'navigate the markets', which is also somewhat understandable, given the overall capitalist economic environment.

However, this argument quickly runs thin when one additionally understands the executive *world*, which is just as socialized and interconnected as any worker organization -- like union culture -- is. So, at some point of maturity, executives are *hardly* scrapping with each other in a dog-eat-dog arena -- there's just as much cooperation and solidarity as there is cutthroat competition, mostly dependent on the extent of one's willing acculturation and participation in such a social environment.

That, plus the government underwriting of any structural financial risk -- as we explicitly saw in 2008 -- means that society should really be grouping *all* white-collar work *together*, and not treating involvement in the markets as being anything special or particularly deserving.

Any argument at this point, then, for overall 'navigating', or 'making correct decisions' just exposes the overall system of balkanized private-property-based entities, when all decision-making over social production should really be done at *mass* scales, on a *collectivist*, liberated-labor basis.

[Aslan]

There is a reason why a job is called a job. Job implies you work not for any pleasure of productive passion. Instead you work for the sake of earning a living. However, what is the difference of you and your superior? You are in a hierarchy in which you have no interest in being in, but you can't leave in fear of starvation and economic ruin. This is the ''free of choice'' in a ''democratic'' capitalist nation such as the US. And while all this is happening while the fat-cats who lead the company you work live luxurious lives but their inferiors get shit when actually doing more work

Spot a problem in our system?

Capitalism is like a never ending casino. While a very few win and prosper, the others who either aren't winners or didn't get an ace in their deck (being a doctor or lawyer) are forced to live under the boots of the capitalists like maggots! This is not what I want and surely not what you want either!

Since you live in Florida I know you can see what the modern day capitalist system has brought us. An isolated, consumerist culture where the government uses divide and conquer for us to waste our free time. And distracts us when we need to address our problems. This is what America is, and where I live, the result of this is an America is an infrastructure that hasn't been replaced since the 1980s! dams and bridges ready to break! A train system slower than a running person. These are exactly what corporations like this have contributed to America.

[Comrade #138672]

So, the common argument against increased taxation on the rich is "Don't they deserve the money that they earned?" and the common rebuttal is that there is only so much money that a person can spend. But my question is: Did they really earn that money?Of course they are going to say they earned it. It makes sense from their perspective. They cannot say they did not earn it. That would be awkward.