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On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

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Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#111

Post by nkozyra »

furyg3 wrote: post #48

While there's a lot to debate in the article, kudos to Graeber for talking about a taboo. White-collar employees 'work' (periods of focused concentration) a lot less than 40 hours. There are exceptions, and HNers may deny this fact (because the demographic is different or because the taboo is more powerful in this circle), but Graeber's inebriated cocktail party confessions match my own discussions with friends. Howe…

I think this also points to people with startups. Not working 40 hours - and yes, I mean real work - is often not an option.

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#112

Post by innguest »

dirktheman wrote: post #27
confluence wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That answer is complete bullshit. > In the United States, socialism is virtually nonexistent. Except for Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and Unemployment. And don't forget the military.

By that definition the whole of Western Europe would be a socialist state. Government services like these do not equal socialism. I live in The Netherlands, a pretty liberal kingdom with excellent social security and unemployment benefits. But don't be mistaken, it's not a socialist country. Not by a long shot. The biggest political parties are liberal-conservative and social-democrats. The latter lean towards the le…

Ok, let's use the dictionary definition:

"A political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole".

Most countries are like that, the US and European countries included: those countries own the means of exchange (they decree the fiat money they own as the only legal currency) and they regulate the means of production and distribution (exacting taxes and benefiting cronies).

Moreover, what those countries have is definitely not Capitalism, because capital comes from savings and most (all?) of those countries have a trade deficit (even major exporters) which means whatever game it seems to be they're playing amongst each other isn't the usual praxeological capitalism where both parties profit from a trade. Right now they're playing a game called QE, with Japan winning (which means, losing).

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#113

Post by snarfy »

xpto123 wrote: post #63

Workers in the beginning of the 20th century worked 70 hour 6-7 days weeks, now in many countries we are down to 35h / 5 days. In the next 10 years we will get to 30 or less, we are at a threshold of the 4 day work week that's why its taking longer to cut down on the work hours. The 4 day work week will imply social changes, and therefore the resistance but it will come in the next 20 years. The author understands th…

You need a lawyer because the laws are so complicated. The laws were made complicated by lawyers. I would much rather have a few simple laws, worded in plain English much like the first ten amendments, so that I could represent myself in legal matters.

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#114

Post by shkkmo »

kissickas wrote: post #88
jahaja wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think those rationalisations hold ups. The facts of workforce expansion and productivity & efficiency gains can't simply be shrugged off by "overpopulation". This is intentional political policy, nothing else.

So you agree with this statement?: > The ruling class has figured out that a happy and productive population with free time on their hands is a mortal danger (think of what started to happen when this even began to be approximated in the ‘60s). I was with him until there... I'd like to believe things like that and blame it all on the "evil politicians," but I'm really not sure the "ruling class" is that organized. Th…

I believe he is implying that the goal, "keep the general population employed/occupied to prevent unrest" is consciously held by some 'oligarchs'.

However, the systems which accomplish that goal have emerged via trial and error and were not consciously designed by the 'oligarchs'. The 'oligarchs' watch the broad trends and have supported changes to the system that supported their goal and have hindered changes to the system that do no support their goal on a case by case basis.

I suspect the 'oligarchs' striving for the above goal is not a 'conspiracy' among the elite so much as a shared cultural belief in stability.

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#116

Post by bryanlarsen »

furyg3 wrote: post #99
jug6ernaut wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not going to deny anything you said, its almost 100% true. But I believe your missing an important "fact"(maybe). That is its not really physically/physiologically/mentally possible to put in 40 hours of true "work". Not consistently anyways. So as much as it is we not truly putting in 40 hours, its the entire effort to be available for 40 hours IMO that you are getting paid for.

For sure, that's certainly one of the things that he misses. The midnight pizza deliveryman has a 'bullshit' job where he does nearly nothing because the 1 hour of real work over an 8 hour period is worth it to his boss. Most professional/service work has a large component of this type of availability. But yet we still try to maximize for 40. If we automate the pointless bits, we don't scale back Bob's hours to 20 an…

My google-fu is failing me, but I believe there's a study out there that postulates that the most efficient utilization rate for a secretary is about 40% -- in other words, they should be idle about 60% of the time.

The thesis is that the primary purpose of a secretary is to be available to do work. When the boss wants something done, an idle secretary can do it immediately whereas a busy secretary has to finish what they're doing before moving on to the next task.

Obviously the study contains a bunch of simplifying assumptions, but the general principle applies to many service jobs.

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#117

Post by dognotdog »

byEngineer wrote: post #108

I work at a large bank in the US. We build websites. Internal websites. The company employs maybe 300k people in the US alone. None of the websites gets more than 10 hits a day! There are 5 websites. And we have 40-50 people to support just that! If all these websites disappeared overnight there would be no difference to the bank. And to the society. The best part: the bank has been rescued by tax payer money. If it…

Don't take it out on socialism! Under those principles, the banks either would not have existed in this form in the first place, or been allowed to go bankrupt just as you suggest.

What happened with the bank bailout was pure capitalism, the banks simply bought the government!

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#118

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

logicchains wrote: post #75
coldtea wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well, to be honest in the United States employment is considered to be such a right and sacred duty that we elect politicians based on employment and even make modulation of employment a core function of the central bank. Yeah, part of this is because few have inherited or other wealth, so without employement you just die homeless and hungry in the streets.

>so without employement you just die homeless and hungry in the streets That pretty much doesn't happen in any western country now, due to welfare. If the desire is to prevent starvation and homelessness, transfer payments do a fine job; there's no need for intervention in the labour market or monetary system.

Quite a lot of people have died or committed suicide in the UK recently, because the government decided to change the rules around disability and chronic illness. It hired a shill organisation to declare that the disabled, chronically ill, and dying were fit for work.

So bedridden terminal cancer patients have had all benefits cut and told to look for work.

This is not an exaggeration, by the way.

Graeber has missed something very obvious. We do not have a market economy. What we have is a status economy.

People who get useful stuff done have low status, because in the bullshit economy the ability to get and hold status is the most valuable of all skills.

So all transactions become a test of relative status, and people who have to do productive work have lower status than people who move status tokens (i.e. 'money' and 'power') around. And the weak - the homeless, the ill, the disabled, the outsiders and minorities - have the lowest status of all.

Re: On the phenomenon of bullshit jobs

#119

Post by bane »

furyg3 wrote: post #48

While there's a lot to debate in the article, kudos to Graeber for talking about a taboo. White-collar employees 'work' (periods of focused concentration) a lot less than 40 hours. There are exceptions, and HNers may deny this fact (because the demographic is different or because the taboo is more powerful in this circle), but Graeber's inebriated cocktail party confessions match my own discussions with friends. Howe…

I was able to spend the last 5 years or so working almost 100% from home (that's changed as I've switched jobs recently). I would say I easily did the same amount of work from home as I had in the previous jobs, but I probably really only spent 12-20 hours doing it in any given week.

I think the key though is "available for 40 hours" as you say. Even if I was only spending a fraction of the time "working", the work didn't come in a steady state such that I could just hammer it all out in 2 days and screw off the next 3. I might have to spend 30 minutes answering a phone call here, or an email there, or run out to make a site visit to a customer on one day, and then spend that afternoon writing up a report about the visit, whatever.

Most of the reason this happened is that, just like with any manufacturing job, you can't keep on steady work if your work inputs are delayed, and just like that, white collar jobs also have work inputs and outputs and they get hung up for all kinds of reasons, so you practically can't keep up a steady work tempo no matter how much you might want to.

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