A coldly rational person probably wouldn’t care what her coworker is paid — at least not to determine satisfaction with her own compensation.
That hypothetical rational person would only need to answer a simple question for herself: Between wages and other benefits, does this job give me more total value than any other readily available one for my skills? What a coworker is paid wouldn’t change her answer because that coworker would have a different calculus.
The trouble is that very few people are fully and coldly rational. We’re social creatures. What we’re paid matters to most of us less than how that pay compares to others. Your $50,000 salary feels very different if your peers make $40,000 than if they make $60,000.
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