So my best friend for a long time is working in the same field as me now and has a same level job. I earn 5 times his salary with basically the same job and experience.
I work 8 hours a day on a flexible basis, he has minimum 2 hours a day to do and basically no limit. This ends up in him working 6 to 9(pm) everyday, even weekends, holiday and during a trip even if he took a day off. His manager expects him to do this work and also not to tell HR that he his doing so much because -jokingly- “then he would maybe get a raise and they couldn't be able to afford such an amazing employee”.
He has no rights to get any overtime back since it is stated in his contract and he doesn't inform HR. I don't do overtime except if needed and I will absolutely get any hour of overtime I did back. Neither of us has a high manager/owner position so we are just normal employees and the company can run one/two weeks without us. So we are basically at the two opposites right now. He is overworked/low salary, I am just fine/high salary. Also he can't afford much because of his salary and he could easily get a higher one than me regarding his background and qualifications now.
We went multiple times on holiday together and I am slowly getting over it, he spends the evening working and gets extremely agressive if we tell him to stop. Even when he is done he starts looking for mails and goes back at it. When we speak about a random subject that even remotely relates to his company he tells us how perfect what his company does is and how they do the best thing in the world. His company also is in the “luxury” part of our segment so what they do is basically just overpriced and not that amazing. He really gets upset if I tell him that some products 10 times less expensive are also working fine and relatively similar quality So everything comes back to his company. He also wears sweaters and jackets with the company logo on it. Money also is a Problem since he can't afford going out or doing activities when we travel together and he is like “yeah I am not earning as much I can't have this lifestyle” in a arrogant maner. But I am pissed since his choices are putting him in this position.
How can it be that someone is so into his company that he accepts such miserable working conditions and does it happily ? What did go wrong to come to this point? and what can I do to help him not to end up doing an inevitable burnout ? I don't want to just ruin our relationship because of his/our work and life choices