You are nothing more than cow dung

And there's nothing you can do about it.

Recent findings shed new light on the increasingly unequal terrain of American society. Starting at the top executive level: You may have thought, as I did, that the guys in the C-suites operated as a team -- or, depending on your point of view, a pack or gang -- each getting his fair share of the take. But no, the rising tide in executive pay does not lift all yachts equally. The latest pay gap to worry about is the one between the CEO and his -- or very rarely her -- third in command.

According to a just-reported study by Carola Frydman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Raven E. Saks at the Federal Reserve, 30-40 years ago, the CEO's of major companies earned 80 percent more, on average, than the third-highest-paid executives. By the early part of the 21st century, however, the gap CEO and the third in command had ballooned up to 260 percent.

Now take a look at what's happening at the very bottom of the economic spectrum, where you might have pictured low-wage workers trudging between food banks or mendicants dwelling in cardboard boxes. It turns out, though, that the bottom is a lot lower than that.

So keep risking your lives driving to work and stressing out over your job. Once you're dead it all ends.

Not very upbeat is this post. I'll try to do better next time.

(read more)