> Been doing extreme over-hours in the hope of fixing stuff once and for ever, only to realize your job becomes more and more like shit-shoveling, since management starts to feel invincible (and protected by your contributions)
Correct. Also, they won't give you that money if they know your motivation is the will to fix things. The money flows instead to the ones who have receiving more money as their motivation.
Isn't that when you start earning a lot of money?