Stephen A. Smith Twitter-Murdered Some Guy Who Dared Question His Salary

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Times are tough all over. And in fewer places have it tougher than ESPN. The World Wide Leader has been a sea anchor dragging  the Disney ship down since long before pandemic struck and sports went dark. Even the last few years, when Disney was swallowing up golden cash cows like Star Wars, Marvel and Pixar, ESPN was bleeding subscribers as they struggled with cord-cutting, bad management, striking the right balance of escapist entertainment and social politics and went to war(ish) with Barstool. 

Inevitably, cuts were made. People who'd help build the company lost their jobs, even in one of the strongest economic periods in modern history. So there was no avoiding more layoffs when so much of the country was thrown out of work and advertising revenue evaporated overnight. So they recently announced 300 more jobs gone for good. It's genuinely, profoundly, sincerely sad. And if you've ever been unemployed you know it's a thing you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. Even if it's the reality of the marketplace, it's a tragedy every time it happens.

And yet for all the obvious reasons why the WWL is pink-slipping their staff, there's always someone on the internet looking for someone to blame . Unfortunately for one sad anonymous Twitter drone, he picked the exact wrong person to pin these layoffs on. 

Stephen A. Smith is not going to take the rap for this. And he lowered the boom on some collection of 1s & 0s who had the audacity to put it on him:

Lesson learned.

You do NOT want Twitter thumbs when he gets his blood up and the "A" in Stephen A. stands for "Aggressive," as this guy found out the hard way just before he set his account to Private. 

The thing is, Stephen A. could not be more right. This is an argument I've been having with people my whole life who don't understand the simplest of economics. That the same basic principles of Supply and Demand that exists for eBay and your grocery store and yard sales exists for occupations. You can dream of a utopia where Day Care teachers and hospice workers make the same as Patrick Mahomes since it sounded so good coming out of your Marxist economic professor's mouth. But we live in harsh reality. Where the only way to achieve that for the world to end so they're all making $0 per year. Because as long as there are people with different skill sets, there will be inequalities in wages. Millions of people can do what some of us do. Only Mahomes can do what Mahomes does. And for sure, only one person at ESPN could put out this kind of content while having to go through life with Max Kellerman strapped around his neck:

And as a result, Stephen A., as he said, brings in the revenue. Human laborers, like objects - meaning services as well as goods - are worth exactly what someone is willing to pay for them, not some other amount. Disney wouldn't be paying him whatever he's making if they thought they were losing money in the deal. If someone else could do what he does keeping that show afloat for less money, that person would have the job. I operate on that assumption every day of my life which is why try to earn my Cherninbucks every day. (And why I look for anyone who might be able to cover the Patriots better than me, track them down and put a poison blow dart into their haunch.) And for sure I don't waste my time begrudging famous talented people for making lots of money in a free marketplace. 

Trust me, once you think the same way and stop trying to success-shame people who are good at their jobs, you'll be happier in your life and not being chased into hiding by a megastar with 5.2 million followers.