If you base how much someone gets paid on the amount of physical labor they go through for their job, the world as we know it would be fucking retarded. Of course engineers/programmers etc should get paid more than labor monkey’s. Want to know why? Because it’s those engineers that are creating jobs for the labor monkey’s. If we didn’t have people with the skill level, and design capabilities, than first off laborers wouldn’t have a whole lot to do. And also, they’re jobs would be alot harder.
Engineering also goes into making jobs for the assembly lines and such easier.
I’m not saying that all engineers deserve their paycheck, but I’d say a much higher percentage of engineers contribute MUCH MUCH more to their company than your average assembly line workers.
oh and p.s. I worked for Toyota as a Press Operator, and also worked on the assembly line. I know the types of people I’m talking about. As do a lot of the people replying in this thread.