Does anyone read the workplace blog, Ask a Manager? The woman who runs it, Alison, worked in HR and hiring for many years and has answered thousands of reader's questions about tricky work situations, raises, managers, etc.
Frequently when reading it (and especially over the last few weeks, there have been some particularly relevant questions), I'm often reminded of the MMM blog post Get Rich With: The Position of Strength.
SO many of the question on the blog stem from not having the financial freedom to leave a job, needing time off but not feeling like they can ask for it, etc. - that is, NOT operating from a position of strength. And while I think Alison generally has great answers, there are a lot of cases where she'll say, "That's probably too much time to ask off for when first starting a new job," etc. It's clear from most of her answers that the employer always holds an incredible amount of power...and that could be mitigated if you were operating from a position of strength.
It's very saddening to read how many people are stuck in their current job because they don't have any leverage.