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On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

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Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#351

Post by 13rules »

briandear wrote: post #257
mikeash wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine you could purchase some sort of financial product that would pay out continuously to cover your taxes. Basically a perpetual annuity, with some wiggle room built in to account for changes in tax rates and property valuation. I don't know what a realistic rate would be for such a thing, but probably quite low. So you'd probably have to put in something like 50x your annual property tax payment.

While that would be cool, the concept of never owning your land smacks of feudalism. It's almost like we're sharecroppers to the government. Taxes are important, however, those taxes could be collected instead by taxing the consumption of necessary resources rather than just having the piece of ground. For example, fire protection -- it could be argued that the virtue of owning land itself doesn't necessarily require…

I've long thought the exact same thing. Taxation of property based on the government’s assessed value seems unfair simply at face value. It punishes the financially responsible citizens who pay off their property in the scenarios you mentioned. It seems to me that if you buy a piece of property you should be able to live there as long as you want without paying any taxes on it. Why should you be indebted forever to the government?

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#352

Post by eru »

DrPhish wrote: post #350
eru wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't my time be better spend taking on a second job as, say, a programmer (which I am good at) instead of becoming a mediocre craftsman?

Quite possibly, but I _personally_ found that working with my hands complimented working with my mind alot better than putting in 16h days of straight programming. The returns may not be as good as a second job, but I also didn't burn out. Of course, that assumes that you enjoy the reno/carpenter/craftsman thing. That said, whatever way that allows you to bring in the most (net) money in the least amount of time will…

Oh, if you enjoy crafting as a hobby, that's something different, and then obviously worth it.

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#353

Post by AndrewKemendo »

Tzunamitom wrote: post #304

First let me start by saying I am someone who has worked almost exclusively doing a "bullshit job", in fact if there were a scale of bullshit jobs, I think that Management Consulting would probably be placed at the apex of bullshit. I have felt the pain described, and was with the author right up until the point where they started talking about the tube workers, which struck a nerve. Tube drivers can bring the system…

I think this is a fantastic interpretation and hits some of the nails on the head.

>The yardstick by which you've chosen to determine if a job is "worthwhile" is whether anyone would notice if those workers disappeared.

This is how I judge mine and others' work on a normal basis. As a result, I have always been jealous of those who are ultra-specified because they are the literal choke points of production or whatever effort is happening.

Thinking about it more though, it would seem to me to make sense that people should be fluid between capabilities. Much like you are instructed to diversify your investment portfolio, perhaps you should be diversifying your skill sets.

The trouble there is that you end up a jack of all trades and master of none. This leaves folks like me in a gulch - and generally always dependent on a subject matter expert to get things done in nearly any domain. On the flip side I can move between domains fairly fluidly at a reasonable if not sufficient level of competence to get the job done - making my core skill the skill of persuasion (to hire people onto my teams etc...).

I don't know if there is an answer to this problem here but I think it might be worth thinking about more.

Cheers!

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#354

Post by dredmorbius »

r00fus wrote: post #299
richardjordan wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've said this before in other contexts, but it doesn't have to be a conscious decision or conspiracy. A key concept from Physics that I wish was more widely understood by the populous at large is that of the "stable attractor". In chaotic systems you often get certain configurations which are locally stable, often highly stable, and they often attract more elements of the system into this configuration. It's a commo…

The continued push to remove regulations on policy-buying is the conspiracy. The US confluence of money and politcs hasn't always been as "free flowing" in the past, ie, prior to the overturning of McCain-Feingold and establishment of Moneyed interests have been hard at work trying to push this country over a cliff so they can swoop in afterwards and profit off the wreckage. That's well documented and one party (the…

Moneyed interests have been hard at work trying to push this country over a cliff so they can swoop in afterwards and profit off the wreckage.

Citation needed (and appreciated).

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#355

Post by Attocs »

RougeFemme wrote: post #305
Attocs wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know what you mean, have seen the same thing - I just wonder if it is a culture that started in govt? It surprises me for a country that is supposedly struggling to gather the resources to meet the needs of its less fortunate people that there is obviously a mountain of resources being supplied to those that are contributing very little economically but could actually contribute a lot given the motivation/opportuni…

I've worked on both sides of the government/contractor line and my gut feel says it's a culture that started in government, but I could be wrong, obviously. But since there are policy-makers and politicians who believe that one of the functions of government is to provide jobs, it makes sense that it would start on the government side. There would be little to no incentive to be more efficient since that would result…

Government should provide jobs - so they simply pay people to do unproductive jobs rather than removing some of the hurdles to new business starts, lowering costs of compliance etc etc....gosh I love this country

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#356

Post by rarw »

craigyk wrote: post #271
rarw wrote: post #213

(1) As a lawyer I love how to non-lawyers the legal industry (usually BigLaw) is always the go to example for things that cost a lot but do nothing. (2) All these lofty ideas and conspiracy theories are great but bullshit jobs exist for one reason - most people suck at their job and are perfectly O.K. with it. It's nice to think of labor as a machine. A system where everyone tries to be efficient and strive to do the…

The legal industry is mostly "bullshit" work. To think otherwise you'd have to believe both: (1) the system is perfect at making good laws which have the precise consequences desired. (2) the average number of laws decreases, rather than increases over time (barring major overthrows, revolutions)

I don't even know how that argument makes any sense.

Re: On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs

#357

Post by quadrangle »

eru wrote: post #349
quadrangle wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ok, I'll bite. Interesting hypothesis. What's the control? Given that government exists and has a significant role in the system, how can we control for that in order to identify whether it is cause, correlation, or mere coincidence? For the record, I think the issue with government isn't government per se but the extreme levels of regulatory capture .

You can try and compare different countries. Some have much bigger governments than others. (E.g. Singapore's government lives of ~15% of GDP. European governments are typically closer to ~50% of GDP.)

Holy moly, you could not pick a worse control comparison than a city-state financial center when trying to discuss economics of large diverse countries.
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