CIRCLE WITH A DOT

@unruly lmao yeah that works

@charlesdelavalleepoussin @gbargoud "So a surgeon work's 13x as hard as a service worker on minimum wage?" this is a misnomer. of course not. the salary gap is a deep injustice that needs fixing. but they both -work-. unlike someone who collects a nice sum just from the money sitting in their stocks.

@ianrogers yeah class traitorship is very common among high-earners and is a serious problem that need addressing

@charlesdelavalleepoussin an important thing here is that, in many of these high-earning industries, you will be pushed out of your career by complex social factors if you don't demonstrate that you "fit" the culture, and demonstrating that fit is -expensive-. It's an induced demand phenomenon: spend grows to meet available income and you'll be treated as a pity case (and denied promotions/opportunities) if you're leaving below those expected means.

@charlesdelavalleepoussin per this article https://yourbrainonmoney.substack.com/p/i-make-good-money-why-do-i-still

"41% of households earning $300K to $500K are living paycheck to paycheck."

@lritter the number of boosts on this post indicate that mastodon is not beating the "social media for software engineers" allegations

@lanodan "rent-seekers" is a somewhat less poisoned word in the discourse

@apophis yup!

@icedquinn yeah "rent-seekers" is a very useful term

And noteworthily: a NYT opinions journalist who earns a $120k salary and another $200k on their investments and tenant rent absolutely _is_ part of the capitalist class and rich, even though their income is lower than the hypothetical surgeon's!

@apophis yeah exactly

a surgeon earning $400k with few investments living paycheck-to-paycheck (very possible if they have a sick parent with high healthcare costs or high childcare prices) has more in common with a food service worker than with Jeff Bezos, but the system is designed to make both workers forget that.

Your regular reminder that "the rich" aren't people who earn large paychecks. They are people with capital that generates returns: investments, property, company shares. "High income earners" are not an intrinsic enemy of "the working class" – many of them are a member of it!