...the mysterious thing to me is why people choose these "tournament-like professions" in the first place. I think the whole "tournament profession" thing is an

...the mysterious thing to me is why people choose these "tournament-like professions" in the first place. I think the whole "tournament profession" thing is an illusion build for the purpose of unfair exploitation by the few at the top. The natural reactions imho to encountering a "tournament situation" should be to either: (a) just run as far away as you can from such a discipline/industry/trade or (b) rebel and burn the system to the ground from the inside, be the joker that just wants to "see the world burn" because you'll just make it a better place for others by burning it clean. It's as stupid as playing the lottery. In academia people should just rebel and ask for one of two things: 1. higher salaries (like significantly higher than the average income that someone with a similar qualification would get in industry!), OR 2. tenured positions with lots of "free" time to do research and the security that even if they pursue unpopular lines of research and get negative research they'd still get to keep their tenure. People should not accept working for the "hope of much better status/income" in the future, they should aggressively and unreasonably demand IMMEDIATE compensation for their struggles, not work for expectation of a "better future". There are enough money and resources in the system for almost everybody to "have their cake and eat it too" and you shouldn't settle for anything less! Now if people would start thinking this way, worldwide academic institutions would collapse, but I think this would be a good outcome as, imho, despite their contributions to mankind's progress, educational systems and academic institutions are mostly unreformable and can only be rebuild from scratch for the better.