Once you pay someone enough to allow them to live comfortably, bunging more money at them is not a terribly effective motivator.
In Britain, or England at least, we seem to have great trouble really accepting this. The banks crashed despite the hugely escalated salaries paid to the chairmen, but we don’t learn. I wonder if Sunday’s abysmal performance by the overpaid England team and their £6m man will make more of us wake up to it.
Dädbeats.
I love this post which I came across via @paul_clarke. It’s long and worth reading, but to summarise one key point: It describes someone who turns down a much bigger salary somewhere else, because the job he has already pays enough for him not to worry about money, and allows him to pursue his vocation as an artist. The moral is “hire artists”. More cynically one could say “hire smart, creative people who have a passion for something which doesn’t make them a living, and give them less money but more flexibility”. Either way, it works and everyone wins.
Life and Physics 