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by ihumanable 765 days ago
Another thing to think about that is also sad and just sorta becomes part of the background noise of existing in society is exploitation. If you ignore the emotionally charged connotations around the term and focus on its meaning

> make full use of and derive benefit from (a resource).

Capital is in the business of exploiting Labor. It is the only thing that makes sense in our economic system. For anyone doing labor for $X for a company that then sells it to a customer for $Y it must hold that X < Y or else the company will fail. The arrangement most people operate under, myself included, is one where you are willingly underselling yourself. The trade off that most people point to is that the people are willing to do this because the stability of getting $X all the time regardless of this weeks / months / years sales is worth foregoing $Y, essentially you are buying stability with the difference. Although the recent rash of layoffs for companies, regardless of how well they are doing, does offer a counterpoint to that theory.