4 ms·

I still have never seen a concrete example of a job which is clearly a bullshit job. Any suggestions?

by jl6 6y ago

aspaceman 6y ago
Has always seemed like a rhetorical device to me. In effect no job is actually bullshit since if it was it would be eliminated. The truest "bullshit" job is one where you are absolutely irreplacable for a single, trivial piece of knowledge. I.E. I'm the only one who can print the records at the end of the year, and otherwise I do (practically) nothing. That's how I've always thought of it, but others may disagree. Often times it feels like a way for creatives and engineers who make the product to express some (rightful) resentment towards the folks who manage people and business.
- dd36 6y ago
  Bullshit jobs, worth a listen: https://www.npr.org/2018/08/28/642706138/bs-jobs-how-meaningless-work-wears-us-down https://www.npr.org/2018/08/28/642706138/bs-jobs-how-meaning...
- watwut 6y ago
  Corporations are not effective and useless positions are not necessary eliminated.
- SuoDuanDao 6y ago
  There's also jobs that exist as the result of Moloch traps, e.g. many corporations need to keep a lot of lawyers on staff because their competitors are litigious. If they all agreed to be less litigious, they could all realise a huge net savings. I imagine much of advertising is similar, albeit in a less straightforward way.
prepend 6y ago
I think of as these rent-seeking organizations that don’t provide value and don’t need to exist. For example, Elsevier has this monopoly on publishing so they need to hire staff to manage everything. Those staff do real jobs- accounting, sales, IT, etc- but there is not value created. So I might call that bullshit. Layer of layer of real functions and interdependencies of people and groups all costing and resulting in salaries. But if you entirely removed every Elsevier job from existence it could be replaced by scihub with minimal disruption. Poof all the jobs could disappear. I think of meaningful jobs as those that create some objective value.
- czzr 6y ago
  Where does scihub get the papers from, in this scenario?
  - jimbokun 6y ago
    From the researchers.

I still have never seen a concrete example of a job which is clearly a bullshit job. Any suggestions?

by jl6 6y ago

I still have never seen a concrete example of a job which is clearly a bullshit job. Any suggestions?

Has always seemed like a rhetorical device to me. In effect no job is actually bullshit since if it was it would be eliminated. The truest "bullshit" job is one where you are absolutely irreplacable for a single, trivial piece of knowledge. I.E. I'm the only one who can print the records at the end of the year, and otherwise I do (practically) nothing. That's how I've always thought of it, but others may disagree. Often times it feels like a way for creatives and engineers who make the product to express some (rightful) resentment towards the folks who manage people and business.

dd36 6y ago
Bullshit jobs, worth a listen: https://www.npr.org/2018/08/28/642706138/bs-jobs-how-meaningless-work-wears-us-down https://www.npr.org/2018/08/28/642706138/bs-jobs-how-meaning...
watwut 6y ago
Corporations are not effective and useless positions are not necessary eliminated.
SuoDuanDao 6y ago
There's also jobs that exist as the result of Moloch traps, e.g. many corporations need to keep a lot of lawyers on staff because their competitors are litigious. If they all agreed to be less litigious, they could all realise a huge net savings. I imagine much of advertising is similar, albeit in a less straightforward way.

prepend 6y ago

I think of as these rent-seeking organizations that don’t provide value and don’t need to exist. For example, Elsevier has this monopoly on publishing so they need to hire staff to manage everything. Those staff do real jobs- accounting, sales, IT, etc- but there is not value created. So I might call that bullshit. Layer of layer of real functions and interdependencies of people and groups all costing and resulting in salaries. But if you entirely removed every Elsevier job from existence it could be replaced by scihub with minimal disruption. Poof all the jobs could disappear. I think of meaningful jobs as those that create some objective value.

czzr 6y ago
Where does scihub get the papers from, in this scenario?
- jimbokun 6y ago
  From the researchers.