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A comment on Understanding the Historic Divergence Between Productivity and a Worker’s Pay [pdf]. Parent comment

Re:Understanding the Historic Divergence Between Productivit... by ryandrake on Thursday September 03, 2015 @08:10PM (#10168196)
If the _average_ productivity is higher than the _average_ pay, then there must exist at least one particular job or category where productivity is higher than pay. These "underpaid" jobs may be unevenly or evenly distributed across the entire spectrum of jobs, but they must exist--unless the measurement of productivity is in question.
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Re:Understanding the Historic Divergence Between Productivit... by WalterBright on Thursday September 03, 2015 @09:25PM (#10168393)
Sure - if all the jobs were included. You'd have to include things like the CEO, contractors, etc. The accounting for all this isn't easy. If the productivity increase comes from installing a machine, that doesn't mean the machine operator is adding more value - the machine is. The productivity increase would then accrue to whoever took the risk in buying the machine.

I would agree that it is complicated to do the accounting for this, and it's easy to get confused.

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