If you want to make good pay, you have to make it happen. You have to change jobs occasionally (every 2 years). You have to suck up a bit to managers. You have to be at least average at your job. You have to manage your CV. And you have to negotiate.
I'm not saying this is right or fair or nice.
I'm just saying the vast majority of people I've worked with don't do any of those things (except for being at least average at their jobs). Then they're surprised when it's been 10 years, they haven't gotten a raise or a promotion and they don't have a CV that can get them one.
If you don't play the game, you will lose. We all know the game isn't fair. But you have only those options.
I've played it for the last few years and I'm very well paid. Playing does work. People just don't, in part because no one tells them to.
Well you bought into the myth of competition and you have done well in your particular segment of the economy, good for you. But most jobs in this world are just not challenging. Most of the meaningful work in this world is not particularly challenging or competitive, it just needs to be done. Rooms need to be vacuumed, children need to be washed and trucks need to be driven from A to B. So your message to the people who scrub your toilet is "If you don't want to a lower salary than last year, just scrub my toilet harder and faster than the other guy"? Maybe that other guy is a bit older and slower. Have you considered that 10 or 20 years from now you will also be older and slower? Most people are not interested in "gaming" the system, nor are they particularly good at it. Most people are content with comfortable lives in which they play some meaningful/useful role.
To be clear, I never said no one should be a cleaner and I didn't say the way for a cleaner to do better is to worker harder.
Quite the opposite: cleaners don't make much money. But managers do. So if you're a cleaner and you want more money, have a plan to become a manager. Move companies to somewhere that pays better. Start your own cleaning company. Just don't spend 40 years cleaning, never ask for raise, never change jobs, work for minimum wage and wonder why you never became a millionaire...
Of course, if you're content being a cleaner then good luck to you! Just don't say "capitalism cheated me" when you got exactly what you said you were content with...
If you want to make good pay, you have to make it happen. You have to change jobs occasionally (every 2 years). You have to suck up a bit to managers. You have to be at least average at your job. You have to manage your CV. And you have to negotiate.
I'm not saying this is right or fair or nice.
I'm just saying the vast majority of people I've worked with don't do any of those things (except for being at least average at their jobs). Then they're surprised when it's been 10 years, they haven't gotten a raise or a promotion and they don't have a CV that can get them one.
If you don't play the game, you will lose. We all know the game isn't fair. But you have only those options.
I've played it for the last few years and I'm very well paid. Playing does work. People just don't, in part because no one tells them to.