I think this makes an interesting observation, but I don&#x27;t agree with the conclusion about &quot;crab mentality&quot;.<p>Flip it into an experience that many people experience in their lives, they buy product X and they pay $Y for it, then due to circumstances they don&#x27;t control, the seller decides to start selling that product at $Y-$Z dollars, a big discount. The original buyers feel &quot;ripped off&quot; because the seller changed how they valued the product, without changing the product.<p>There has to be a real name for it, but I call it value dissonance. Where the value you assign to a good or service is suddenly different than the market value. Everyone who bought a house in 2007 experienced it in 2009 :-(.<p>Work output is just as much a good or service. And you consciously or unconsciously assign a value to it based on what other work around you &quot;gets&quot; as salary. So if you change what you pay one set of people but not everyone, you introduce this dissonance. And it can be hard to process.