I think the first issue you need to address is your frustration. It is definitely caused by unreasonable expectation of "a salary must always reflect a value a

I think the first issue you need to address is your frustration. It is definitely caused by unreasonable expectation of "a salary must always reflect a value a person brings". It would be great if that is true, but in reality it often isn't. Once you fix this it would be a lot easier to decide what to do. I have heard starting a comic line with that kind of man as one of the characters may be extremely fulfilling and benefitial for the rest of us :-)