The Value Of Symbolic Analysts - 1110 Words

The Value of Symbolic Analysts Robert Reich categorizes America’s workforce into three distinct groups, routine producers, in-person servers, and symbolic analysts. Reich defines the first two groups as principally manual laborers, and the third group as people who work and create value using their minds. This would include occupations such as engineers, attorneys, scientists, professors, executives, et al. Symbolic analysts are objectively and quantifiably more valuable than the other two groups combined. To establish an operational definition of value, we recognize value as the amount of revenue and/or opportunities an individual provides. The reason symbolic analysts command much more wealth and are inherently more valuable than the†¦show more content†¦They argue that without them, the CEOs would not have a working company to run. While the union workers are technically not mistaken, they are however neglecting a number of factors, the first being that an individual’s compensation is dir ectly correlated with the amount of value that the individual brings to the corporation. When we break down the responsibilities of a lowly sales associate, their only task is to assist customers in purchasing items. An executive manages everything from negotiating with suppliers, organizing facilities, creating new departments, delegating tasks to aforementioned departments, et al. The real value that executives add to the company is exponentially greater than that of the average worker; this fact is quantifiable. Another issue that union workers do not take into consideration is the fact that sales associates and other manual laborers in a broader sense are largely expendable, as such is the nature of a low skill job. The fact of the matter is that the minimum-wage workers need their CEO more than their CEO needs them. The brutal reality is that if workers are unsatisfied with their wages the executives can simply replace them with people that are satisfied, leading us to the issu e of scarcity and surplus of labor supply. The issue of scarcity is a basic concept in the study of economics, and furthers contributes to the value of symbolic analysts. Reich discusses how demand for symbolic analysts grows with the advent