Do you begrudge high earners?

[cheerscheerscheerstomeyeahcheers]

Do you actually understand what they do and why they earn so much?
Would you be actually willing to put in the time and effort yourself?

I see so much griping about people that earn a lot, but I also see a lot of ignorance about why they earn what they do.

Same here.

I like my job, but I work to live rather than the other way around.

Do you think they are being hard done by? Or is it that even a Tory government thinks that’s a fair slice?

perhaps not in your circle but statistically yes it’s true.
https://www.legalcheek.com/2020/09/over-half-of-city-law-firm-partners-went-to-private-school/

https://www.suttontrust.com/news-opinion/all-news-opinion/nearly-two-thirds-of-new-cabinet-attended-independent-schools-and-almost-half-attended-oxbridge/
https://peoplemanagingpeople.com/news/average-ceo-uk/#:~:text=34%25%20of%20the%20CEOs%20in,school%20vs%20the%20UK%20population

Supervisor positions are usually paid a tiny bit more and carry a whole load of responsibility. You only do it if you think you have a reasonable chance of progressing up.

Depends what the job is. I dont begrudge all high earners. And you cant take away from people who work hard and put their time and energy into what they do. BUT - as a senior grade NHS employee, in a role that requires an advanced degree and a huge commitment including many extra hours a week, it makes me furious there are professions that pay new graduates what I have worked up to over years and years in the NHS. And which I still need to supplement with freelance work, meaning I am working the equivalent of 6 days a week.

They are still paid more.

Not really they tend to be paid about 50p more a hour, which is about 20 quid and about 15 after tax.

Nobody deserves a salary of 300k . Absolutely nobody works hard enough to make that amount of money . So I suppose that yes I begrudge them . I also begrudge the idea hard work means good pay .

Nonsense. Everybody deserves a decent salary. But there is no need for a cap.

If you didn’t have people at the top earning high salaries, there wouldn’t be jobs for the people at the bottom.

People are typically compensated based on how much they know rather than how hard they work. They are compensated based on how much responsibility falls on their shoulders and how much a company relies on them. If I walked out tomorrow, my boss would be mildly inconvenienced until I am replaced. If DH walked out tomorrow, it would cost his company millions.

If people weren’t paid hundreds of thousands a year, imagine how much more tax the rest of us would need to pay. Think of all the things one high earner’s tens of thousands of tax pays for every year. Our economy couldn’t survive without them.

Bullshit ! If you think about high earners are CEOs they all have the same degrees lots of us have . Do you really think I don’t know what my boss does ? I get paid a high wage ( 55k to 100 k ) he gets paid 500k . This idea that people in high Ola es have some sort of skill nobody else has is utter ridiculous!

I begrudge those who earn lots in jobs that should not equate with the money ie footballers, useless reality “stars”, etc
And I begrudge those who are crap at their job and get promoted through the old boys network or nepotism
I also begrudge those who earn tons of money but never give anything to those in real need.
Finally I begrudge that jobs in business making money pay far better salaries than doctors and nurses saving lives are paid.
Other than that crack on.

So if the CEO’s salary was dropped to your current salary, what would yours drop to?

Lets face it, any savings on CEO salaries would go right into shareholders pockets. It isn't going to trickle down to the cleaners, and it certainly won't be reallocated to nurses.

Precisely. And as CEOs are directly responsible to the shareholders, the shareholders will be inclined to reward their good work.

Begrudge is a strange word.

I don’t begrudge them their success at all. But I do resent the attitude that they worked hard and deserved it, especially if they are in certain over remunerated professions (finance, management consulting, corporate law etc).

If they are nice respectful people and understand that, at least in part, their success is due to luck and connections, I am very happy for them, especially if they give back in some way (time or money).

I was in an over remunerated profession and then did a decade of teaching, earning about 10-20% of what i did in my previous career. I worked at least equally hard as a teacher and actually found it more rewarding in many ways.

Yes, that was a choice I was never going to make lightly as it is probably one of the most important choices a person can make.

@PotatoPudding ,

It doesn’t really work that way.

Block shareholdings (pension funds etc) dominate the vote on corporate issues. And the end holders of the shares have very little say. And, of course, the big pension funds are staffed by people who are also overpaid, so they vote ludicrous schemes through for CEOs.

The most egregious examples were the bonuses paid in 2008, all voted through months before the banks became insolvent and the shareholders lost everything. That was close to criminal.

Do I begrudge hard working high earners who pay their taxes, don't whinge about benefits scroungers, live their lives in a politically humanitarian way? No, absolutely not.

Do I begrudge high earners who get rich off other people's misery, do everything they can to avoid tax, look down their noses at others who are less fortunate and are politically driven by greed and conservation of themselves at the expense of others? Fuck, yeah I do.

It is not someone's wealth that I judge. It is how they behave with it.

Same.

My dad earned a good salary 25 years ago. He brought home £7000 a month and from that my parents saved £4000 every month and had £3000 for meeting the household expenses. He had to travel to London though at least once a week and New York once a month. Even when he was working in the Edinburgh office he worked 12/13 hours a day. In the office for 5am and not getting home any earlier than 6pm. I would not want to deal with the stress that he had to deal with then. My dad was a stockbroker analyst.

Nobody talks about premier league footballers or music artists on these threads. Is it so self evident that only they deserve the enormous sums they earn? The reality is you get paid for your output, if your rare skill or talent is in demand and will generate revenue then you will earn more money, it's not really about working hard or working more hours in the day.

And Google isn't a person

I don’t understand this, I really don’t agree that those earning highly always it’s due in part to luck or connections. Sometimes sure. Yes. But quite frankly not always and I read this as a way to undermine achievements,

also your comment on resenting thay they worked hard and deserved it. You sound like you do absolutely begrudge people success. And I wonder if that is due to your own work history.

No, but I do think it's unfair that essential, critical jobs are often paid less than (imo) stupid worthless jobs. Like "Influencer".