For example, I often hear fellow Americans brag about how many hours they put in or how intense their work is. This is true all the way from the blue collar trades to the most white collar (management consultants are notorious for this).
In reality, it's better to use fewer hours to accomplish the same goal. There is no inherent value in applying more time to something.
The truth is the SW architect, the CEO of many corporations, etc are more efficient than the lowest level workers. I know this is not popular, and it makes many uncomfortable, but it is undeniably true. This is because both the SW architect and the CEO and the management consultant and the operations manager, etc, are all into automation, which is an efficiency increasing process.
This is not just automation in terms of building robots (which maybe a SW architect is involved with), but also automation in terms of making the lowest level workers replaceable by developing corporate policy, procedures, etc. The CEO provides the service of automating investment returns to his/her company's shareholders.
In this light, it is obvious why certain professions earn more. They are way more efficient with their time.
> I’m somehow worth 20-40x what someone at an Amazon warehouse is.
Because your work is quite a bit more efficient. I mean, like many here, I write software for a living. Once my software component works, it works. It will work forever with minimal maintenance once it stabilizes, and will provide the company with many many years of value, even if I and my team were to drop dead. In other words, we are automators. The automators are always going to do better.
Anyway, going back to the lazy/hard-working dichotomy. These terms are used with unnecessary moralistic overtones. There is nothing wrong with working two hours a day, and there is nothing inherently good about working 14 hours. We need to stop acting as if those who work more have some inherent virtue. This leads to all sorts of social pathologies such as the toxic version of the bootstrap mentality.
I don't think this has anything to do automation, it's more likely due to their ability to delegate
And I don't mean their skill with delegating I mean the fact that they are in a position where they can tell other people to do their work for them.
It's easy to appear super productive if you are in a position to claim the productivity of other people as if it were your own.
Management consultants automate away the explanations a CEO or executive has to give. They can just point to their superiors and inferiors and say 'Bain said to do blah'. No one's going to get fired for buying Microsoft, or listening to McKinley.
Inside the industry itself, the actual consulting is heavily automated. Consultants are mainly glorified data entry technicians, inputting numbers into pre-built models and using pre-made assets to assemble a good-looking presentation. There's some skill to it in terms of speaking, but the process is heavily automated to make it extremely efficient.
It definitely saves the executives time, which is why they'd hire them.
> Some software is certainly very efficient and productive but after many years in software I can tell you that a lot of software work is repeated broken window fixing.
There is a common fallacy I see often when driving on the freeway during rush hour. Some people seem to believe that if they just took the surface streets, they would get to their destination faster. That is because they are spending more of their time moving on the surface streets, but on average they're still going slower than the freeway people. In short, they trade a large variance in a higher average speed on the freeway for a lower variance in a lower average speed on the roads.
This analogy extends to hard work. Americans glorify the worker taking the surface streets -- i.e., the one actively "doing" something even if the amount of work being done per unit time is very small -- rather than the one in the stop-and-go traffic -- the architect who works two hours a day intensely, and then takes time off, or the SW engineer who works for 30 minute stretches and then rests to compile his software. In reality, the latter two get to their destination faster, even if it seems like they're doing nothing most of the time. For some reason, the steady work is valued more than the high acceleration/high deceleration work.
That is to say you identify frustrations with software (repeated broken window fixing) which certainly exist, but they do not detract from the fact that the automaton enabled by software is still incredibly valuable. I don't see how this is even debatable. The increase in productivity directly attributable to software is undeniable.
EDIT; I'll point out that I ran away from management consulting. I hated it, and I have little good to say about the industry. But it's undeniable they automate away the decisions of executives to the point people are willing to pay.
That is all there is to it.
The irony about hard work is that everyone can be a hard worker so you are more likely to end up in a buyer market if that is your selling point.
I said "do", as in "to perform an action". Ambition might lead you to do things, but that's not what I address.
Now think of the people in high-level positions who make more than you. Do you think they are on average doing more productive work than you? I am guessing you feel the answer is not so obvious with this question.
This you?
If there's a repeating pattern of people not understanding what you're writing, why not write more clearly? It will make everything better.
Someone who works at a warehouse or fast food joint is a much harder worker than a software architect. Probably also working 60-80 hours a week across a couple jobs just to pay rent. Meanwhile I just spout bullshit all day and play corporate politics without really knowing anything nor having much ambition, and I’m somehow worth 20-40x what someone at an Amazon warehouse is.