[mwfunk]

The same applies to technical managers. It also applies to the managers of those managers- in general, if you're higher up the org chart you expect to get paid more than the people that report to you. If you get promoted, and are given more responsibilities, you expect to get more money. If you get promoted, and are given more responsibilities but are not given a higher salary, then you can probably get that higher salary for the same job by going elsewhere.

I don't see this as a management vs. engineering situation (especially since in there are plenty of companies that prefer to promote engineers to management rather than hire MBAs or external hires in general). It's more just a human hierarchy situation. The people higher up the hierarchy are held accountable for everything that happens below them in the org chart, even though they are by definition not doing the work of all of those individuals.

That's a functional hierarchy, of course. In a dysfunctional hierarchy, it's more like a pyramid scheme and the higher up you are, the easier it is for you to escape scrutiny by blaming those below you. All orgs I've worked in have been somewhere on the functional/dysfunctional spectrum, nothing's 100% good or 100% bad. There really are no ideal ways to get groups of people to work together towards a shared goal without introducing things which are injustices when seen in isolation, whether there's a hierarchy or a flat org or what have you. I hope someone figures out a better solution but I'm not holding my breath- like democracy and capitalism, it's the worst system in the world except for every other system that humans have been able to come up with.