Independent
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
- Joined
- Oct 28, 2006
- Messages
- 4,629
"I started at this company in 1998 as an equity trader, became the head of equity and commodity trading and, a couple of years before A.I.G.’s meltdown last September,"
It was equity and commodity trading.
You need to do more research on commodity trading; your assumption is not correct.
Also, your assumption that "they'd be willing to do that if they earned $100k per year." does not reflect how labor compensation works in the USA.
The issue is not about his "big income".
I did spell Galt incorrectly in my post.
You are correct that I don't know a lot about commodity trading. I assume that that traders don't really have a use for the commodities, they are simply trying to predict which direction prices will move. One way to make money is to be a few minutes quicker than the other guy - you read and process the news on acres planted in soybeans in Brazil a little quicker than someone else and make the trade before they do. (I assume that usually it's putting together a number of factors that aren't that obvious.) So, what am I missing that's relevant?
I understand that, under current laws, investor preferences, and technology some people can command a lot more than $100k in these jobs. I was thinking about an alternate universe in which, possibly, there were a lot more people who could do the work. I probably distracted from my real point with this comment.
I think that other people draw a conclusion from the "big income" that I'm questioning. IIRC, the point of the novel was that "society" benefits tremendously from having these incredibly talented people among us. If we don't treat them respectfully enough, they may leave us and then we'd be in deep ____. I think that in some cases very high income people have "created wealth" for more than themselves and their employers, but I don't think it's clear that all highly paid people do, or that the highly paid people at AIG Financial did.