I assume the McDonald's worker is a human being with dreams beyond working McDonalds, and under the current political-economic system, many of those workers don't have a shot at achieving those dreams. They have to work much harder to climb the ladder, and the higher up you get, the easier it is to climb up even higher.
I don't believe the capitalist mode of production is the ultimate answer to how we organize our economy. I want to see the same democratization of government take place in workplaces.
I started off in high school working in fast food, now I work in a corporate atmosphere, making a comfortable living. That hard work you speak against made me hungry to succeed. Making someone comfortable does more to ensure their failure than it does to ensure their success. FYI the ladder is harder to climb closer to the top than it is closer to the bottom. The jobs become more competitive. it's fairly easy to go from a $20,000 a year job to a $40,000 a year job.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p31-xQ2Rrz4&feature=share&list=PL63D8A8BDB7705AA0That democratization of government that you're so taken with is so marred down with bureaucracy and regulation that it's ineffective. In a corporation or organization there has to be a deciding factor. If anything our government should be proof of that. There will come a point that there will be indecision, There has to be a decision maker or else you have a stale mate and you've failed.