Some jobs are far worse than others (working in a disgusting sewer) and others are far harder than others (managing an organization of thousands of people).

No matter what the economic system, somehow you need to convince someone to work in the sewer and operate complex orgs of thousands of people.

One option is to use a gun - you point it at people you don’t like and make them sewer workers.

Another is to arbitrarily hire and have no consequences. This leads to incompetence and mismanagement, as often happens in government everywhere and in socialist / communist nations that nationalize industries and staff them with political hires.

In capitalist societies we give more stuff to people who do hard jobs and / or are highly effective. This is the carrot - work a high stress or shitty job and get more stuff. The stick for failure is you get less stuff, but at least you aren’t shot in the head as they do in other systems.

You can argue until you’re blue in the face about neolibs / the rich / whatever. Doesn’t change the fact that inequality is a requirement for society to function if you expect someone to work in shit-filled holes underground all day while others pontificate about philosophy.