"There's nothing stupid about working for $30,000 doing a job that's worth half a million, when your friends are earning $20,000 as barristas at starbucks."

That's patently false. Undervaluing your labor because your friends work in a poorly compensated industry makes no sense. If anything the money you are earning when you are younger is more important to secure for ROI purposes.

All right: to the best of my current understanding, there is nothing wrong with ever taking a salary vastly under market in one's twenties, including literally performing CTO-level work worth half a million and equal to the work of many developers under you (or hell, even leading or directing them), for $30,000. There's nothing wrong with that, and it's not a bad life choice. Especially if one's social life is also important and includes many other twenty-somethings in various professions.

we're just going to disagree if you think otherwise - we don't have to get into an argument about it. In my world view not everything is about maximizing salary.

I don't think you're wrong, per se, but barring that I'm really unclear on what point you're trying to make.

my only point is that the supply at that price is greater than 0 - that some people will do it. who are in their twenties. you won't find someone even over thirty willing to do it though. it's a descriptive statement.

Seems to me that the number of retired engineers working as Wal-Mart greeters is actually more than one, and has been for a while.

? but they wouldn't take a job as an engineer at that same salary; whereas a kid who is working as a wal-mart shop cart person or cashier, would do CTO-level technical work (if they happened to be able to) for the same salary -- or more precisely the number of such kids who are willing to is not exactly 0. It is larger than strictly zero.

Why would they do that?

Maybe they just want to get out of the house and do something useful?

Otherwise if it was for $$$s, and they aren't poor without a safety net, seems like they'd be better off learning higher value skills and getting a better job.

Why would they do that?

I've considered it, but I don't think I can do that work.

I'm not actually retired, and may never be able to, because of a catastrophic health event around twelve years ago. I get paid very well when I'm working, and that plus learned frugality and a supportive family has enabled me to get by pretty comfortably, but the same health catastrophe created a situation in which it's quite difficult to find people who want to hire me. That difficulty is increased by a couple of other personal limitations that don't hamper my productivity (I can be outstandingly productive given the right tools, goals, and situation), but the right combination of things is just a little different from and more specific than the common default, and that's enough to have a strong negative effect on my chances of being hired. I'm a white crow, is what it comes down to--or a nail that sticks up.

My solution so far is to take work I'm likely to excel at when I can get it, and especially when people are comfortable paying me on par with what I've been usually been paid before (because it's good pay), but to be open to any steady work of any kind that I think I can do, because I also often have to weather extended periods of no work. The longest so far has been a little over two years.

Oh, and of course I'm always working on projects meant to become things that will generate residual income in the long run.

I would certainly work as a Wal-Mart greeter if I thought I could do it. There are a lot of other low-paying jobs that I would do if I thought I could do them. The main problem with low-paying jobs is that a lot of them require sustained physical exertion that I can't do, or rigid work schedules that I can't observe, or both.

I feel like you're not fully articulating your point here; in what circumstance would prioritizing leisure entail working for 6% of one's market value?

doesn't really matter. as I just wrote, my only point is that the supply at that price is greater than 0 - that some people will do it. who are in their twenties. you won't find someone even over thirty willing to do it though. it's a descriptive statement.

Are you sure the people that will do it are the ones you want to be doing it (if you are paying?). If they are so vastly underestimating their market value, perhaps it's because they are actually vastly overestimating their ability.

I have to agree with the perhaps inappropriately named logicallee. And I'd go further - it's not just a matter of age, nor (as others in this thread have said) of inability or stupidity, if someone works for a salary under market value. I am far from the best at my job in the world, but I'm ok, and for the longest time as a freelancer I charged way under the market (in fact I suspect I still do, though not so egregiously). This was - I think - not because I "overestimated my ability" or anything like that. I was simply not a business-minded person. I was afraid to ask for more. I earned enough to live from, and the rest seemed somehow distasteful to me. I'm not saying this is the ideal, just a fact. And if I have these characteristics, perhaps others do too.

Once you find the person stupid enough to accept crap pay for doing something that earns you tons of profit - are you sure you found a person smart enough to do what you need?

There is a big difference between "how much value you create" and the percentage of that that you can capture for yourself.

In the non-labor market airlines a great example of this. They create tremendous value for their customers (fast long distance transportation), but the industry as a whole is not very profitable.

Same for employment. Many (hopefully most) employees generate more value than their salaries, but that does not mean they can negotiate for that value to be added to their salary. If there is someone else with similar capabilities willing to do the job at $x, then negotiating pay above $x will be difficult.

accepting "only" $30,000 at the age of 22 is a lot less stupid than accepting "only" $30,000 at the age of 52. people's lives and motivations are vastly different, especially the most qualified, smartest people's lives.

This is honestly the strangest logic I've read on this site. You're basically arguing for exploiting workers by undervaluing them and saying it's ok because people's lives change?

it's just a descriptive statement about the market. for that matter, how many 50+ year olds even apply to be barristas at starbucks? perhaps nobody should work at a starbucks as a barrista, but we're not exactly going to blame everyone who does so in their twenties.

The biggest problem with "Hire someone super smart at a vastly-under-market rate." is that some other company will come along tomorrow and offer them market, and the best case is that they give you two weeks notice before jumping ship.

The worst case[0] is that they don't show up the next day and you are SOL.

0. Assuming they don't actively try to sabotage the company that has been exploiting them.

this is also the same reason why 'overqualified' is an actual concern.

people at the bottom of the totem pole view money as simply a scarce resource -- when it becomes somewhat more abundant, you have other things to worry about and it becomes a means to an end of hiring and retaining good, reliable people.

one way of doing this is not to substantially underpay someone who's worth a lot more on the open market, because eventually it will bite you in the ass.

Is it just me or does this comment make no sense at all?

> There's nothing stupid about working for $30,000

No, it's just rational as an individual, yet it ends up driving down wages. If, as a group, this kind of pay was shunned, that wouldn't happen. Don't devalue your job, wait it out.

Employers are in a better position to divide and conquer, than employees are to unionize.