Wealth is created through human labor. Period. The value of anything depends solely on the skill and knowledge honesty and sweat of the people that put it together. Saying anything else is just a justification for the parasitism of the middleman. Of course, it isn't only the line worker who creates wealth; the designer, the marketer, the administrator, the manager, and a host of others all add value, too. But they are workers as well. We must never forget that, to do so is to insult our fellow men.

The act of ownership itself adds nothing. At best, it provides an organizing principle, planning, coordinating, facilitating, documenting, and a host of other intangible activities required in the production and distribution of complex goods and services in a complex society. But we can hire people to do that. And the middlemen usually do, few of them have any knowledge or interest of the industries they control, or pride in their firm or product. For them, a company is just a machine that generates money, they could care less what it does, it's history, its effect on the society and environment, the people who buy its products or those who work there.

It can be argued that ownership provides the motivation and drive and pride to get a business moving and keep it profitable. But that kind of owner usually works his ass off, and he earned my respect a long time ago. He provides labor, not ideological justification. And that kind of owner is becoming less of a factor in our society of professional middlemen. Capitalism is finishing off the entrepreneur, and replacing him with interchangeable careerist executive drones.

Armies need generals, and supply clerks and truck drivers and record keepers, and a host of other non-combatants to function, but they do not need political commissars, and they certainly do not need cheerleaders.

As for my alleged bitterness...let's just say I don't have an idealized and romanticized view of work. I don't achieve self-actualization and fulfillment by slaving to achieve someone elses, and I would find it extremely distateful, if not morally unnacceptable, to achieve it by having someone working for me. My ideal job would be self-employment, that would indeed bring satisfaction and joy to my labor. But that isn't always possible; not that I blame anyone for that, it's just the way things have worked out. I feel an obligation to pull my own weight, but I feel none to kiss the ass of those who fit the yoke on me.

Maybe I'm like that Randian architect hero dude, except when my boss modifies my work to his liking, I don't think I have the right to blow it up.