Very fair points. Hypothetically: what if the professional organization ("PO") were more concerned with all of the programmers' share of the pie, as compared t

Very fair points. Hypothetically: what if the professional organization ("PO") were more concerned with all of the programmers' share of the pie, as compared to say sales or management, instead of each individual programmer's slice? To work, I imagine logistically it would require open salaries across the board as opposed to only the top dogs (as is law for public corporations), which of course may be a hard sell (if only because it's counter-intuitive, and distinctly not in the interests of management, who have already tipped the scales far to their own favor). But having worked for a tech company which did have open salaries across the board, I can at least anecdotally vouch for its effectiveness in maximizing both employee output and employee salaries. Of course an individual's negotiating skills still somewhat come into play, and this is where the exact pecking order would ultimately be determined (say, as a percentage of the PO's share of profits), but I would argue such a structure more aligns the programmers' incentives to work together to increase their share, than it would promote "every man for himself" attitudes. What I think we really have here is a giant prisoner's dilemma, complicated even further by globalization. So realistically, yea, I agree with you. It ain't happening. But I think it's fun to think about, so, thanks for your reply :)