I see this confusion often when discussing wages. Depending on your job, you will be paid between 1/5 and 1/3 of the value of your work. The rest of that money goes to overhead, materials, and profit for your employer. 'unskilled' labor (old definitions, not work which requires no skill) is closer to the 1/5, as it often requires equipment, high disability and worker comp premiums, and often requires some form of materials (construction, food service, retail, ect.). The 'Professions' (doctors, lawyers, engineers, ect.) are usually at the 1/3 side of the spectrum, as most of the 'cost' comes from years of education and training, rather than equipment. The work also comes with fewer physical risks both short term and long, in general.
This means that a full hour for our laborer produces an economic value of 10Cr, with a wage of likely 2Cr. Considering this laborer can also get a meal for 1Cr, something that would have cost me almost an hour of wages when I worked in food service, he is doing fine.
Keep in mind though: we are talking about the Imperial average wage at the Imperial average tech level. The productivity of a laborer with an 'ultimate shovel' and an 'ultimate space-shovel' are bound to be very different.