The economic argument for businesses is that, essentially, they are meant to bear the cost differential between what a consumer can do themselves or pay for. (Rick Grimaldi explains this fantastically in his book, Flex, in ch. 2)

i.e., it's more cost-effective for you to buy bananas than for you to grow them yourself — in this way, the underlying function of a company shouldn't be to feed ego, but instead, to feed you bananas. BUT, that's a very "assembly line" reality which is not fully obsolete, but getting there.

With pensions and other incentives all but gone, we either stay where we're valued, or move on — as you explain here, really well. This is a good lesson for employees to learn early and learn often. Invariably, every person hired will eventually be a person retired (or fired), and in that constant change, you can't worry too much about the people you leave behind — because they sure won't worry about you.