Some people feel that certain workers like nurses, doctors and teachers are undervalued and should be paid more, especially when other people like film actors or company bosses are paid huge sums of money that are out of proportion to the importance of the work that they do.
-How far do you agree?
-What criteria should be used to decide how much people are paid?
As society evolves, people become more concerned with social issues. The distribution of the wealth among the high, middle and lower classes is a constant cause of disagreement between political parties and different social groups.
Objectively speaking, the fairest way to decide how much someone should be paid for a certain job would depend on the level of skill and knowledge involved and how relevant it is to society's prosperity.
However, this would only be applicable to a utopian society. Economy is not based on fairness, but on money flow. Each profession's wage is determined by how much money circulates in that area of work. A teacher cannot expect to be paid more than a film feature actor, even though their work is unarguably of more importance to society. The wage of a teacher is accumulated through tax payer's money. An actor's on the other hand is determined by the amount of people that pay voluntarily to go and watch a film in which they participate.
I do agree with the idea that such vital contributors to our society such as educators and health care providers should be more valuable to society than corporation owners and football players, thus we should strive for a fairer distribution of wealth. Nevertheless, people should keep in mind that fairness is not always possible. Moreover, in many cases we actively contribute to social differences by refusing to pay higher taxes and choosing to spend money on products, services and ways of entertainment that we are not exactly necessary to us, whereas education and health care, for example, are vital.
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