

How strongly is pay linked to productivity? Nice gals finish last? - cwan
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/26/do-nice-gals-finish-last/?hp

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jdminhbg
I wonder what the pay gap would be like if you added in zeroes for all the
unemployed men in this recession:
[http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/arch...](http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/05/number_of_worki.html)

Returning to the piece at hand, this quote really bugs me:

"But one could also argue that pay differences among all individuals — as well
as gaps between men and women — reflect differences in personality,
preferences and principles as much as productivity.

If this true, then policies like executive pay restrictions and higher
marginal tax rates would not necessarily lower productive contributions."

How did she go from "maybe those factors are as big as productivity" to
"therefore there won't be any effect on productivity" in consecutive
sentences?

There are some interesting links in the article, but a ton of shoddy thinking
in and around them.

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jchonphoenix
This article isn't based on any grounded research or survey. It is basically a
collection of what the author feels is happening in the current day with
random selective citations from other articles written by other authors
touting their own opinions.

If you're going to write about your personal opinions, don't pretend you are
knowledgeable and speak as if you are talking about facts.

We have enough articles in the every day media that pretty much have "citation
needed" written all over them. We don't need them on hacker news.

~~~
noelchurchill
The basis of the article is that "machiavellians" who are more likely to cheat
and lie are also more likely to succeed. If you believe these then maybe you
don't feel the need for citations.

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noelchurchill
This struck me:

 _But one could also argue that pay differences among all individuals — as
well as gaps between men and women — reflect differences in personality,
preferences and principles as much as productivity.

If this true, then policies like executive pay restrictions and higher
marginal tax rates would not necessarily lower productive contributions. They
might even discourage selfish opportunism that can be counterproductive to
society._

