[xp84]

Minor observation here (sort of non-tech-related): any of these strategies is doomed to failure (if success means “producing a product or service that’s excellent) if your workers can plainly see that there’s no future where they could support a family working at this company. Retail is the prime example of this: Retail sales used to be a decent career choice and someone good at selling and customer service could expect to be able to enjoy a middle class lifestyle with things like vacations and a good home and car. And stores featured helpful salespeople who knew their merchandise and could genuinely help you make your decisions. Now in90% off chains, it’s obvious that there are maybe a tiny handful of positions at corporate that fit this description, but the chances are about 99% that this won’t be available to you. So retail employees are incentivized to do the absolute minimum until they get fed up, quit and repeat – because why would they work harder to be excellent? To earn a pin on their name tag or something? Maybe a 50¢ raise?

You can apply this to tech workers too but probably on the next income ladder step: if I know I’ll never stand a chance of serious wealth creation because I have zero equity, remind me why I’m supposed to ignore my family all evening to meet some “KPI”?