The author David Graeber was an anthropologist and professor at my alma mater, London School of Economics. He used to teach at Yale University, but was kicked out to England and died last year in Corona-stricken Italy at the age of 59.
His book "Bullshit Jobs" hits home, to the extent I imagine that he might have followed such a destiny because he told the truth.
Approximately 40% of white-collar professionals in developed countries feel that their work is bullshit (ridiculous.) Not only are there non-value-added tasks such as emails and meetings with no substance, creating strategies that no one executes, and issuing reports that no one reads, but there are also tasks harmful to the world.
If there is no war, no army is needed, but because one country has an army, other countries also have an army. Similarly, some companies have corporate lawyers and lobbyists, so their competitors will hire them too. But for society as a whole, the munitions industry and tobacco company lobbyists are only harmful.
The fashion and beauty industry introduces models that are much thinner than scientific health standards and processes photographs to create unrealistic beauty standards. And it advertises to consumers and touts that they must buy XX to try to become like the artificial models. This is also an example of a bullshit job.
People with bullshit jobs feel guilty that their work is meaningless and even harmful. A high salary is paid in return for the feeling of guilt. On the contrary, people doing jobs that are really needed, such as cleaning, garbage collection, and caregiving, do not feel guilty and therefore are paid cheaply.
The author cites doctors as one of the few occupations that have both necessity and high income. Many doctors do, but some prescribe drugs that are not needed and do more harm to their patients. For example, changing the definition of hypertension throughout the medical community to increase the number of patients, or continuing to give sleeping pills without resolving insomnia.
The longer the length of service at a large organization, the higher the percentage of people who have experience in bullshit jobs. The author has never heard from any employees who have been with the same company for more than 30 years that they have no experience in bullshit jobs.
This also applies to me. I had thought that if I was promoted, a rewarding job would be waiting for me. There was a time when this came true, but then there was a flood of meaningless and unproductive assignments, which accounted for 90% of the position in the final year and only 10% of the work was meaningful.
Currently, I am living a comfortable life with the funding for retirement. I don't have to work for money, and if I do work, I can't have a bullshit job.
If you work and get paid, you will inevitably have a stake and your free speech will be restricted. In such a situation, it is difficult to recognize the problem correctly. By talking with no strings attached and 100% honesty, I would like to lead the world to go in the right direction.
