If what you should make is based off of your knowledge and education how is it that all those athletes make so much money? I hate to say it but you kinda sound like someone who has never really done a real hard day of work. Work is work and is completely equatable weather it's done with the mind or the hands. A police officer probably just as hard as Tim will this year and keep safe, hell a few will even die keeping people safe but they're not doing as much as him right? Because they're not really using their heads. Linemen are the same working hard to keep your lights on and some while die while on the job this year, keeping your lights on. But they're not really working either since they're not using their heads. If these people that weren't using their heads picking up trash finally realized that they weren't really working because they're "dumb", I'm sure you would be complain about the stench.
Athletes are not paid appropriately. Payment is generally tied to how much value you can make for others, and how scarce your skills. Manual labor is not scarce, and has low qualifications. Even skilled labor and trade work is not that well compensated even though they provide a lot of "real" work. Raw labor and trades are unfortunately paid poorly because it is relatively easy to find and does not make more money for clients. Same goes for teachers. I am sad to say it, but jobs like linemen and cops can be filled a lot easier than an athlete that is required to perform at a certain level to win games and thus make advertising money.
Entertainers are sometimes highly skilled, but often not. Yet they can still get paid lots of money because other people, and even entire industries, can make a lot money off of them...even though they contribute very little to the functioning of society besides gossip and occasional entertainment (most of which sucks)
When it comes to doctors or CEOs, some (not all) have very rare talents and minds that can make decisions in ways others would not be able too. People like Jobs, Gates, some surgeons etc can do things other people can't, and take responsibility for calls other people would not. And they make the right calls. That's why they get paid. Now whether 300K a year for repairing hearts, lungs, cracking chests and giving potentially dangerous medication vs $38m for steering a billion dollar company is fair, well, thats a different topic. But there is more to "how much someone gets paid" than "a hard days work".
Obviously in all these cases are exceptions, this is just my general view on payment. In a perfect world, skilled and manual labor would be paid better in general, while (some) entertainers and (most) athletes would be paid less in general. Unfortuntately entertainment and advertising are a big source of income, not infrastructure. But when it comes to people who use their brains at work, well a brain with years of experience in a high stakes complex field is a hard thing to replace.
