Communications of the ACM
'You're Paid What You're Worth' and Other Myths
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Your pay depends on your productivity and occupation. That common notion is challenged by Jake Rosenfeld, associate professor of sociology at Washington University in St. Louis.
In "You're Paid What You're Worth, and Other Myths of the Modern Economy" (Harvard University Press, 2021), Rosenfeld instead places power and social conflict at the heart of his analysis.
Job performance and occupational characteristics play a role in determining pay, but answers on compensation lie in battles over interests and ideals, he says. Four dynamics are paramount: power, inertia, mimicry, and demands for equity.
"It's been a decades-long process of employers gaining more and more power over pay-setting, with many employees relegated to accepting whatever amount their bosses offer," Rosenfeld says. The decline of organized labor is one factor, along with "the rise of a new management philosophy that maintains that profits should be redistributed upward, not shared broadly with workers."
From Washington University in St. Louis
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