Yes, the VC-backed startup ecosystem that was the origin of this website does rely on propagating the myth that we live in a meritocracy to ensure it has enough cheap labor to build prototypes that its anointed few can acquire at rock bottom pricing. But we've been through enough cycles of it now that we've started seeing the patterns.

> rock bottom pricing

Value is not set by what you put into it, it is set by what people are willing to pay for it.

Browsing in a thrift store can be very enlightening!

> Value is not set by what you put into it, it is set by what people are willing to pay for it.

Is a human life literally worthless, because they never pay to be born?

The map is not the territory, the price is not the value.

History clearly establishes that the open market assigns substantial value to human life. We just happen to have outlawed trading in it. Human life has been deemed worthless by force of law.

Less facetiously, you're committing a semantic error.

It can be empirically observed that human lives are not assigned much value when choosing to start a war.

Some people will pay a great deal to have a baby. Some will pay to abort their baby.

What value something has is totally dependent on who is valuing it.

More formally, it's the Law of Supply and Demand.

> Value is not set by what you put into it, it is set by what people are willing to pay for it.

What do you base that belief upon?

Have you ever bought something that you didn't think was worth the money at the time?

It's axiomatic - it's the definition of value.

"Markets clear" is one of those meritocracy myths that we the hoi paloi get taught explicitly all the while the elite will tell you to your face they don't believe. Google and Meta are massively profitable companies built on the idea that the concept of value is manipulable.

Where did you get the idea that those ideas are mutually exclusive?