Executive Compensation

In 2021, some executives are supposed to have made up to 670 times more than the typical American worker, which is an extreme gulf that can never be bridged by "hard work" or determination on the part of lower employees--not at the standard compensation rates they receive right now.  Statistics like this are indeed unprovable hearsay one way or another on an epistemological level, but there are many people who would insist that the concept of this ratio is just or who would not care about the enormous gap.  The most well-known executive position is that of chief executive officer, or CEO, or someone who helps oversee a collective organization, though there are other C-suite executives such as the chief financial officer (CFO).  While it is likely not surprising to almost anyone that C-suite executives would be paid very well, it might shock them to hear just how well they are paid, and how little the workers they rely on are often paid in comparison.  An executive, however, would have to work far harder than humans are even be capable of in order to deserve such massive salaries along with the additional benefits.  Even greater responsibility for more of a company's functions would not make some executive compensation levels just.

If executives like CEOs were only paid 50 times as much as the lowest ranked workers in their companies in base compensation alone, not counting bonuses, stocks, and severance packages, it would still be the case that they are very likely not literally working 50 times as hard as all of the workers far beneath them.  No executive I have ever heard of literally works, physically or mentally, say 40 times as hard as even many low-level restaurant, warehouse, or retail workers do, much less 308 or 670 times as hard.  There might be more extensive consequences for the company if the executive makes a certain poor decision (though even some decisions that might stimulate short-term profits are still pragmatically or morally idiotic), whereas a low-level worker is at worst likely to impact a few customer interactions or complicate local processes if they make a poor decision.  Plenty of low-level workers are still working harder in more demanding, monotonous, or unsafe conditions than corporate executives, sacrificing their sleep, physical health, emotional wellbeing, and free time for their jobs in ways that executives do not necessarily have to relate to, all with a greater risk of losing their jobs over even simple misunderstandings than executives are for making more egregious choices.

Of course a higher position within a company should be paid more than the default compensation for entry-level or less responsibility-heavy positions, unless an executive is willing to voluntarily decrease their salary to a more company-wide level.  However, even if an executive does not like what this would entail, none of them deserve to make hundreds of times what lower employees make when those workers are risking more to earn barely enough to both survive and take steps towards savings or additional comforts, if they get paid even enough to just survive on one job.  In other words, it is not that executives should not be paid well, but they do not deserve the extravagant, unmerited amounts of compensation and additional benefits they tend to receive, just as lower workers do not deserve to be paid only enough to barely keep them alive.  Beyond the amount necessary for basic survival and stability, pay could only be deserved on the basis of personal merit and how difficult a task is, and no executive works hundreds of times as hard as the physical laborers they rely on do.

If humans have value, then every person, including executives and their least compensated employees and everyone in between, deserves livable wages for full time positions.  There is no contradiction between paying people a minimum salary/wage that actually helps them comfortably live, or perhaps even thrive, and paying some people more than others because of skill, seniority, or personal accomplishment in the workplace.  It is just that none of these things mean executives deserve quite so much compensation, financial or otherwise, as what many of them reportedly receive for what they do.  They certainly should receive significantly greater pay than a part-time worker or plenty of introductory positions, just not anywhere near as much as they currently make according to the supposed average.  A major obstacle to rectifying this is the greed of people accustomed to or eager for power, which stems from the irrationalism that contributes to their selfishness, greed, and arrogance.

Almost no one, regardless of their economic status, is willing to give up erroneous and fallacious beliefs, hypocritical actions, and self-serving traditions if they are comfortable with them or benefitted.  Non-rationalists are thoroughly irrational, hence why so many of them will not abandon contradictions and assumptions or embrace necessary truths when someone else brings them up.  Non-rationalists with extreme financial and social power are likely to be more unwilling to change as reason demands because they either 1) might not care about logical truths and justice (after all, they probably just base their worldview around whatever makes them feel justified in being materialistic and greedy) or 2) have more economic gain to lose.  This is why external pressure from rationalists is likely what will bring about change.  Some people against current executive compensation might even be just as selfish and materialistic as the executives they envy, but rationalists can avoid the pitfalls of everyone else.