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Comment by smolder | Hacker News Reader

I hope this is a joke. It's a failing or at best a quirk of our economic system that Tim Cook's time can be so highly valued when any number of different piles of well educated people could do 10x more useful work for less money. It's not meritocracy. He's winning the game, but he's replaceable.

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>He's winning the game, but he's replaceable.

~100 million/year says he isn't.

It all comes down to how you define "useful work" and value. A big part Tim Cooks value is simply being a known factor. You might not like that this is valued more than 1,000 engineers, but that doesn't change the reality of the situation.

If Tim Cook was really worth 100 million a year or more and had achieved a state of intelligence and skill unknown to humanity before, don't you think scientists would be scrambling to study his genetics?

He's just not that unique. The employees should be paid more and Tim should be paid less.

I think you entirely missed the point of my comment. Tim Cook is worth 100 million because he is the same person that ran the company last year and is a known quantity, not because he is 1000x smarter.

His value is being Tim Cook: Apple CEO since 2011. This is something that nobody else on the planet has and 1,000 engineers can't build.

Hey, every human is unique and equally irreplaceable. It’s just that some of us are more equal than others.

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