The idea that "they deserve whatever they can get" is one of the criticisms of modern UK/US culture made by Michael Young who actually coined the term in his satirical book The Rise of the Meritocracy:
[Edit: I don't know about the US but here in the UK it is fairly common to define "merit" in ways that don't actually seem to include "performance" - though I think this is a far bigger problem in the public sector than the private].
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment
[Edit: I don't know about the US but here in the UK it is fairly common to define "merit" in ways that don't actually seem to include "performance" - though I think this is a far bigger problem in the public sector than the private].