The other (very good) responses cover relevant ground, but I wanted to address one additional point: "Sometimes you wind up working for an oblivious or sociopa

The other (very good) responses cover relevant ground, but I wanted to address one additional point: "Sometimes you wind up working for an oblivious or sociopathic boss - but then you need to go apply for another job elsewhere." The author's term 'productive loser' is defined by the unwillingness to accept risk to ensure maximal compensation. If you agree that the willingness to take such risks is required, I'm not sure that you're truly at odds with the author's original statement. Further, your 'upper management' examples all live at the 'sociopath' level of the author's corporate pyramid. Sociopaths are eager to pay other talented sociopaths fairly, because they know that they must.