On Thu, Apr 26, 2001 at 01:48:45PM +0100, Roger Wesson wrote:
> Well, this is a concise exposition of the capitalist view of the
> situation. I take a somewhat different viewpoint.
...typical uninformed socialist rhetoric deleted...
Your argument falters on two basic points: 1) You have no idea what Adobe's
actual costs and budget are. Your statement that paying $500 for Photoshop
puts $300 in the CEO's pocket is nothing more than ignorant hype. There's a
lot more than that that goes to paying salaries at Adobe, purchasing capital
equipment, paying the electric bill, and on and on and on. Yes, the CEO gets
lots of money. So what? I'd love to be in that position, but I don't have
what it takes to run a multibillion dollar corporation, and I know it. I'd
love to be able to drive a major league fastball like Mark McGwire, too.
Since neither will ever happen, I don't waste time on wishing it might be
so. I like to think I'm a halfway decent photographer, and a damned good
computer geek, and I'm happy with that. 2) Adobe has done a lot of things in
Photoshop that nobody else did first. Yes, I have and use the GIMP, as well
as Photoshop 5.0. I stick with Photoshop, as I find the interface easier to
deal with (probably because I used it first). Once you get outside the realm
of the Internet and its infrastructure, the world of open-source software (I
refuse to use the FSF's term "free software", because I think it's
deliberately and grossly misleading, but that's another rant) is behind its
commercial competition. Adobe pours money into R&D. The guys working on the
GIMP can't. It's really that simple.
You claim salaries aren't related to a person's value to society. Big, fat,
hairy deal. Society doesn't pay my salary. The company I work for, and its
customers, do. It's up to my boss to decide how much he's going to offer me
for my time. He makes that decision based, in large part, on what he thinks
I'll be able to contribute and what he sees as the amount of money he'll
have available. He is responsible to those who own the company, and NOBODY
ELSE. (No, he doesn't own the company. It's small, only 9 employees, and has
a market capitalization of about US$3 million, but has over 3400
stockholders. They're the owners.)
To me, the average socialist complaint about CEO salaries is simply the
rhetoric of jealousy: "I don't have it, and can't get it, so nobody should."
Baloney. If you're unhappy, it's YOUR responsiblity to change that. Not
mine, directly or indirectly.
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