Being agreeable is the most praised trait at work. It is also the one that shows up negatively in the earnings data.

Warmth, cooperation and a willingness to accommodate get you liked. Across a large body of research they also track lower income — and the effect is stronger for men. It is the least comfortable finding in this literature, and it replicates.

Nobody is suggesting you should be unpleasant. The point is narrower and more useful: the thing you get rewarded for socially and the thing you get rewarded for financially are not the same thing, and almost nobody says so out loud.

Judge, Livingston & Hurst 2012, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology