"Francois-Rene Rideau <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>" wrote: > Isn't one of the reasons why some highly qualified people feel underpaid > the fact that in many structures, they feel they have a value > that is unacknowledged or unexploited by their hierarchy? That is exactly right. Professional athletes are considered to be overpaid, but they are subject to the strange economics of zero-sum competition. How much would you pay for a person or service that dramatically improves your chances of success? For example, do you think the people of Chicago chagrined the $36 million one-year guaranteed contract Michael Jordan got in his final year? Academia is almost a negative-sum game. People are simpy trying to survive (i.e, get tenure), with no hope really of discovering something profitable. This is changing somewhat, esp. in biology with medical applications. I'm glad to see all the sweet cars (MBs, BMWs, Jaguars) and motorcycles (Yamaha YZF-R1s, Ducati 996s, Harley customs) in the parking lot next to the biology building (Bldg. 68) at MIT. I hope that the physics people like myself come upon such riches in the near future, but I won't be unhappy if they don't; in the interim, I don't mind if I drive my dad's hand-me-down Oldsmobile. The solid-state folks are making some headway ... > This may be particularly true when the hierarchy doesn't grasp > the technicalities of the work and/or the far reaching effects > that make the work add value, as compared to other works with > more immediate effects (sale, finance). This is a short-term, local consideration. Once someone starts making hard cash on their skills, everyone jumps on the wagon. > In summary, people are paid according to the value their employer expects > them to bring; but their own expectation about that value differs, > and they will feel underpaid (and complain) or overpaid (and be happy). True -- it takes a few enterprising souls to shoot through and expose an untapped revenue source. Once the cash starts flowing, people can start making competetive distinctions from one another based on how much value they produce. In academic research w/o market interests, it's hard to gauge the value in objective terms. There are ancillary considerations, like fame, cachet gained from Nobel Prizes and gov't. appointments, etc. Regards, Sourav Mandal ------------------------------------------------------------ Sourav K. Mandal [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ikaran.com/Sourav.Mandal/ "In enforcing a truth we need severity rather than efflorescence of language. We must be simple, precise, terse." -- Edgar Allan Poe, "The Poetic Principle"
