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The rise of the pointless job

theguardian.com

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Re: The rise of the pointless job

#301

Post by lallysingh »

tom_mellior wrote: post #238
bomb199 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A Job's Guarantee is a real movement, and a reasonable idea for this reason. Not having a job puts you in a lower social caste - might as well have them doing SOMETHING. Even if it's not especially productive, the small positive affect is better than nothing.

No. Eight hours of soul-crushing boredom every day keeps people in such jobs from doing... anything they want. Like learning stuff that might help them contribute to society in other ways (in a more useful job, maybe). > Not having a job puts you in a lower social caste This is a stupid societal expectation that should be fought rather than supported in the way you say.

It leaves people lots of time to think of better jobs to get. They are also less likely to go to crime.

And they can quit. I mean, a job guarantee isn't directly a requirement in the same sense.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#302

Post by merpnderp »

ItsMe000001 wrote: post #185
merpnderp wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except I like what Bezos does for me. He gets my capital because I get something in return. I'd much rather my money go to one of Bezos services than it be taken from me by the government to pay someone to fill holes. And filling holes doesn't create jobs, it sucks capital from places that do. Bezos on the other hand created whole new industries.

> it sucks capital from places that do We have more than enough "capital". There is no shortage of (completely made up virtual) "money". There always is plenty of money for any worthwhile project - because it is created new for that new project. And if the economy is in trouble because "money!" the government steps in and through intermediaries creates a few trillion, see last crisis. So, please clarify for me, how d…

I guess you’ve never heard of inflation. When the government prints more money it steals value from the money in my pocket. See Venezuela printing money for people to fill holes other people are digging instead of letting a free market allocate reaources.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#303

Post by slyall »

unit91 wrote: post #153

I had a very similar experience once when I worked for the government. I wanted my small desk pointed a different direction, so I rotated it. A few hours later my supervisor and a union rep showed up fuming. They have people for moving things, why was I trying to take their jobs?!

On the other hand a company that I worked for some years back had published a summary of recent accidents in the monthly newsletter[1]

A significant number were for office workers who had tried to change light bulbs or similar by standing on desks or office-chairs and then fallen off.

[1] - Yes, company newsletter could be seen as a bullshit job

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#304

Post by sverige »

epc wrote: post #300
jopsen wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US you often see people holding a sign saying "slow" next to construction or road work. This is a job that could literally be automated with a pole :)

I was that guy as a kid, at least for road work. The role rotated through my crew while everyone else worked in the manhole or on the street. Part of the reason for it to be a human is to serve as a witness for the police when a distracted driver plows into the road crew. This was in the 1980s, I’m sure drivers pay much more attention today.

> This was in the 1980s, I’m sure drivers pay much more attention today.

Missing the /s. Drivers today are far worse than they were in the 80s.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#305

Post by cobbzilla »

Zak wrote: post #210
chiph wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could it be because you're a foreigner? I almost certainly got picked out on every ride on the Munich S-Bahn by a fare agent for a ticket-check because I was obviously not German. Which I totally get - a tourist is way more likely to make a mistake than a local.

It has been my impression, having spent a significant amount of time in Germany, that German ticket checkers aren't primarily trying to detect people who have made a mistake, but those who intentionally ride without paying.

This information may be a bit dated, but I visited Berlin circa 2008 and my friend (American expat) who had been living there for 10+ years insisted that we not pay at the subway, because no one checked. Following his guidance, I never paid for the subway, and was never fined. This was just within the city of Berlin, though.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#306

Post by balfirevic »

chongli wrote: post #255
peterwwillis wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those aren't bullshit either... Who else is going to animate the hair? If there's a robot that can do the job, great, but it has to get done somehow.

No it doesn't. Marvel movies could stop existing tomorrow and it wouldn't matter at all. Life goes on.

If you are going by that definition of "wouldn't matter" then it probably holds for all movies. And lots of other enjoyable stuff. Not a very useful definition.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#307

Post by DrScump »

WJW wrote: post #216
foamflower wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When my family lived in Japan years ago, we noticed that when taking the train, approximately three attendants checked our tickets before we boarded a train. At least two of those jobs are "bullshit" in terms of producing wealth, but they are socially beneficial in a culture where the social contract requires near-zero unemployment. (I, apparently like you, can't help but remember this kind of arrangement when listen…

Is visited the USA just once (in 2003), but there was an old man that took my bag off the end of the luggage belt at the airport and handed it to me. I could easily have picked it up myself, but he was there for those 30 centimeters of bag travel. I remember being amazed about it and remarking the pointlessness of that job to my coworkers.

If this was in the unsecured area, that may not have been an employee, but a stranger trolling for tips.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#308

Post by pjscott »

duderific wrote: post #266
pbrb wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I'll have to brush up on whiteboard interviews. It just seems goofy that 350k is normal! I'm a sr engineer in chicago, and thought there was no way I could command the salary needed to make COL worth it.

I think that's far from normal...if you look at any board of average senior level engineering salaries, even in Silicon Valley and even at the FAANG companies, it's nowhere near that.

Wait, are we talking about salary or total compensation? The latter includes things like stock, and is often quite a bit bigger.

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#309

Post by selimthegrim »

throw_away wrote: post #278
thaumasiotes wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When I was in the US there was a guy handing me a towel in the bathroom. That is an incredibly meaningless and superfluous job! On the other hand, most Americans live their entire lives in the US without ever seeing such a guy. Are you mind-bogglingly rich?

You too may experience this "luxury" by going to pretty much any club (dance or strip) on pretty much any weekend in pretty much any major US city. The opulence wears off quickly, as it is made clear that you're expected to tip and all you want to do is wash your hands like a decent person.

Theu don’t just hand you towels, they usually have OTC type things if you’re feeling ill - you’ll never be more thankful for them until it happens to you when clubbing

Re: The rise of the pointless job

#310

Post by selimthegrim »

chiph wrote: post #203
poulsbohemian wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is very similar to the situation that caused the Swiss to become the mercenaries of Europe. If you were the second son, you weren't going to inherit the farm and thus in a resource-poor country like Switzerland of the Middle Ages, your best choice was to go abroad and find some feudal lord putting together an army. Thus you became a "freelance" and hopefully found riches. I've always thought Machiavelli's dislik…

This is supposedly one of the ways the crescent got on the South Carolina state flag. Under French heraldry, it indicates a third son (when they bothered to use cadency on their coats of arms). Since his chances of inheriting the family lands & fortune were low, many of them set out for Charleston to seek their fortune, following the southern branch of the Huguenots. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_South_Caroli…

Does this have anything to do with New Orleans as well?
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