I wouldn&#x27;t even attempt to justify this in a market-based economy...earning as much as you can to <i>take care</i> of yourself and your family and <i>shelter</i> them from the vagaries of life is kinda the point, right?<p>Actors acting in their interest to maximize happiness and well-being is the basis of all modern non-Marxist economies, and every metric related to those goals shows that this albeit-non-perfect-system works pretty damn good.<p>There really isn&#x27;t any point in rehashing the 160yo Marxism v. Capitalism argument here, I know, but there is almost zero evidence that <i>in a wildly diversified and large society</i> (not Sweden or Denmark, for example), that a government-controlled economy can bring happiness and well-being to its people.