Actually, the guy who can ensure those rail tracks get repaired does have a ton of leverage, and reaps the reward.

It's not just the guy who pulls out a broken rail and nails a new one in place. Finding someone to do that isn't hard or expensive. It's the guy who knows who will do that for a competitive price in a timely (urgent) manner, can ensure such guys are available to thousands of miles of track, has enough replacement track on hand & well-situated, owns (or can rent) equipment to move such long heavy rails to where needed fast, has personnel handling all the QA & regulatory burdens to ensure those rails won't likely fail soon after installation, etc etc etc; few people are willing & capable of pulling all that off. Rail replacement also includes paying some to do "BS jobs" which those with the money & responsibility know are needed, even if seem largely pointless or distasteful to most casual observers. And yes there's some abuse buried in all that; human nature is far from perfect.

I didn't fully appreciate how some earn their keep until I joined a startup. Organizing productivity demands talent and risk, without which (and obtained/retained by salary) very little resembling corporate productivity would happen. Yes, swinging a hammer is valuable; knowing who should swing it, where, when, and to what purpose - moreso.

What I find fascinating is that I feel a strong desire to respond to your statement, write out a long comment (which I've done and posted earlier on in this thread) explaining how I disagree, only to realize that it's really hard to get anywhere when our disagreement is so fundamental and complex.

I stopped to think where we disagree fundamentally, and I think it boils down to this:

Our technological, social, and economic developments, I believe, have led to crazy increases in wealth and comfort, and I suppose happiness too, at least in the West, but arguably even globally. I think we more or less agree on that.

I think we are also in agreement in many ways we're better off than we have been in the past.

We are somewhat less in agreement over the cause of this, and I suppose that could be a worthwhile conversation. I'm inclined to believe capitalism played some role in this, but that, from a 'social evolutionary' perspective, it's become, or turning into a malignant growth. I'd say technological developments play a much bigger role, and perhaps capitalism was just a mechanism that 'worked' to enable this. But I'm by no means certain of that, and it seems to me that there's no way to get anywhere on this subject other than sustained conversation where we move down to our most basic 'axioms' step by step.

Where I am more certain, and where I suspect we agree least, is whether the status quo is 'good enough' and by extension worth defending or 'fighting'.

I think it's not worth defending too much, primarily because I strongly believe that should be no reason whatsoever for us to be working as much and as hard as we do now. The 'general' increase in wealth and comfort pales in comparison to what would be possible if we had a fairer system in place, and I believe it is absolutely worth the effort to take a shot at creating such a fairer system. I think we've learned at least something from the past, and that we won't attempt to just implement a full totalitarian redistribution scheme.

And even if there's a significant risk of our efforts turning into another 'failed utopia', merely the rising social instability and the (I'd say) well-proven disastrous ecological developments are reason enough for me to take that risk rather than making some small incremental changes to our current system.

However, that would be outside of the confines of the discussion in this thread, and that's quite frustrating.

I guess what I'm saying is that without considering these more fundamental disagreements, our collective discussions in this thread are bound to frustrate and not really significantly 'shape' or change our views.

That said, I enjoy reading your views and I mostly just felt like writing this; it's not something 'aimed' at you in particular!

Sure if he's one of a very few people who can do it. If not, there might be someone who's willing to do it for a bit less and his leverage disappears fast.

Leverage comes at the intersection of "benefits lots" and "can be done by few".