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Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina  With respect to social value, yes, absolutely. One of the reasons such people don't earn much is that they don't help very many people... often just a handful each day. They may be well intentioned and very heart-centered, but they're playing in a very small game. Worst of all, when they aren't actively working (such as while they're sleeping), they help no one. This approach is strategically unsound.
However, those who set up and/or use systems to deliver value to larger numbers of people can earn a bundle, especially if that value can be delivered 24/7. P. Diddy may not deliver as much value per person, but he reaches a lot more people, so his social debt (i.e. his income) reflects it.
A teacher may earn $35K teaching dozens of students for a year. A pro speaker can earn more than that for a single speech. The pro speaker can deliver value to more people in one speech than some teachers will reach in their entire careers. The income difference reflects that.
I don't deliver as much value to each individual person as some people do, but because I'm playing in a larger field than most (reaching a worldwide audience via the Internet), I can deliver that value to many thousands of people each day, even while I'm sleeping or on vacation. I earn only pennies per person on average, but it adds up.
Just within the past hour, a woman told me that she was inspired to try the raw food diet after reading about my experiences with it. She lost 42 pounds in 2.5 months. That's a wonderful value she received from this website. I didn't even have to be there because this value was delivered passively. Multiply these kinds of effects over many people x many articles x many years, and it adds up to a lot of social debt. |
Using teaching as an example is interesting. Even if teachers don't work in a government run school we are still paid relative to what the government wants to pay.
It seems extremely difficult to measure the value we are giving 150 students (in senior school) each day. As things stand at the moment, there is no way to differentiate between those teachers who deliver great value and those that do not (even if it does seem obvious to us all).
In addition to this we are teaching young, growing, maturing people who cannot often easily articulate what value they are receiving. Their parents pay and often the students only realise in hindsight what great teachers they had and how they contributed to their growth.
With the shortage of teachers becoming quite serious in the western world it seems inevitable that teaching will become privitised in some way and in fact people will begin to pay a higher rate to receive an education they value.
This seems likely to extend to nursing and the police force.
The world and how we view what we should pay for what we value is changing. And thus people will be able to engage in work that they personally value and society will reflect this also. As always it starts with the individual before it is witnessed and observed in society.