It’s been pretty dead around here, I know — I’ve been pulled away by other obligations, including the new issue, which will feature not one but two of my contributions. Look for that, coming soon!

Just a quick (or, well, now I guess it’s not so quick) note in the meantime on today’s topic of discussion in the part of the lefty Internet where I hang out: Matt Yglesias’s post arguing that it doesn’t make sense to talk about a conflict between corporate fat-cats and workers, since CEOs are in some sense “workers” too. Seth and Doug obviously think that this is a kind of obtuse way of putting things, politically and morally. And I agree — but I don’t think they quite get at the real problem with the argument.

Doug says that “the point isn’t how hard you work, it’s what you take home,” and he goes on to note that the average big company CEO makes about $3,800 an hour. But he implicitly concedes Yglesias’s point that this is all about inequalities among workers, one group of whom happen to be obscenely well-compensated. That gives Yglesias the opening to zing back: “I’m the one insisting on an orthodox Marxist account of exploitation.” That, in turn, touched off some Twitter banter about what share of top-1% income comes from wages versus investments, and so on.