Your value is worth nothing if you can't apply leverage to extract that value in a negotiation. The main leverage you have is your future value, not your prese

Your value is worth nothing if you can't apply leverage to extract that value in a negotiation. The main leverage you have is your future value, not your present value. The company selects managers who are adept at extracting value from you. The manager's only incentive to pay you fairly now is if they want you in the future. But if you could replace the manager, or if a mentee could replace you, you have negative future value. Indeed, the manager may have hired you as a low-paid but senior person to demonstrate their negotiating skills to their superiors. Such a manager could find such a senior person by looking for someone with something to overlook, like a recent abrupt departure -- or someone who didn't value their abilities. You can go pretty far down this rabbit hole of strategic thinking. You could respond by extracting value from your junior members, stealing their ideas or code. Or making them look bad with koan directions or pythian prophecies that turn out to be precient no matter how things turn out. I hope these suggestions turn your stomach, but I have observed that's what happens when people give up on the idea of "fairness" as other commenters suggest. Resentment and power differences are but one source of conflict: culture, thinking- and working-styles, external personal and company forces -- all make it hard to relate to others as humans. Perhaps the best approach is to assume you'll not be treated fairly and there are no alternatives. Your choice then is to suffer or make the best of it, with what you have. Befriend your juniors and your managers, and with every interaction make it as productive and enriching as possible, convincing them that you have their best interests at heart, and that you're taking care of yourself. Embrace the Job's rock tumbler. i.e., even if you can discipline relations by voice or exit, treat exit as the lazy escape. In so doing, you might find your voice, and the next step will not be a graceful exit but a celebrated entrance.