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Comment by autoexec

2 days ago

It comes from crab bucket mentality and a pervasive fear that somebody somewhere might be getting something they don't "deserve".

Everyone who gives a company years of their life should be able to comfortably retire after decades of service, but companies have managed to convince workers that most of them should work until the day they die and only a small precious few deserve to retire and finally be allowed to spend time with their loved ones.

Exactly. "Look at that guy, who has it slightly better than you. He's really the problem!"

  • How does that work? That guy, pensioner, who has it slightly better than you, is a different way of saying that:

    1) that guy gets your labor, for decades. 4 decades to be exact

    2) for less than you'll get for that work

    (that's what getting a higher pension actually means in the real world, with money being an abstraction and all that)

    3) he (or she) doesn't get more because they worked harder or better, but because they were working when a random political vote needed to be made (paid for, really). And that, not only won't repeat, but there's absolutely nothing you can do to change the situation to your benefit, even just to equalize. That last part is of course what makes taking away their benefits attractive.

    Sounds pretty unfair to me. At least with a CEO they did something to get what they got, and there is a way to get their position, even if most will never achieve that.

    • It's absolutely unfair. But the solution is to raise the rest of us up, not tear these people down. Why don't I have a retirement like that? Why don't you have a retirement like that? Those are the questions we should be asking. Not "He shouldn't make that much!" The people who earn literally 100X that pensioner are laughing at us as we fight each other

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