Repairing or Buying New Redux

The comments about why we don't get things repaired much anymore made me think more about why. Ron and I often talk about the current reluctance to pay people a decent wage for jobs other people don't want to do.
We've seen this up close and personal with daycare providers. The Nanny Diaries shows some of the emotional side of it, too. (Jobs we don't pay enough for certainly include K-12 teaching, but there's some emotional satisfaction in that, at least for a while.)
I read about it in this year's common book at Otterbein, Under the Feet of Jesus. I didn't like the book much, but it does a nice job of conveying the emotions of immigrant migrant workers to Americans who might not have thought about how such people feel.
And should we extend this argument to people? The doctor who spent three hours to put in my new, shiny knee is getting paid a lot more than the physical therapists who have been working with me for ten weeks to repair the effects of years of neglect and misuse of the muscles, ligaments, tendons, etc. around the knee.