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“So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

theguardian.com

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Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#71

Post by ddeck »

mdda wrote: post #62
ddeck wrote: post #55

The entire asset management industry is a candidate for the bullshit job title. Within the equity asset class for example, aggregate performance is worse than passive investments and there is ample evidence that substantially all managers are unable to actually provide the service they are selling. As an industry, it effectively taxes savings and distributes those taxes to the employees within the industry, sometimes…

Wow, I'm surprised to see a comment so critical of Venture Capitalists on HN. But I guess it's fair: The VC industry as a whole badly underperforms the S&P index on a risk-adjusted basis. Or aren't those the asset managers you were talking about?

Well VC is a very small part of the asset management industry and you are correct that that's not really the area I was referring to.

The bulk of asset management is in listed equities and government/corporate bonds and this is what I was primarily referring to.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#72

Post by jaytagdamian »

crdoconnor wrote: post #44
blfr wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Single payer still acts as an insurer and needs actuaries (even if they're not called that) to figure out which procedures make sense with their limited resources.

Not really. There is no need to price the cost of insuring a 30 year old white male living in Croydon. If he is ill, he gets treatment. If he is not ill, he doesn't. The only thing close to actuarial science that the NHS actually needs is QALYS calculations. This is only really used for calculating how worthwhile very expensive treatments that target the very old or very disabled. The number of people needed to do th…

All you need to know is that you 'maydie' if you go to Croydon's hospitals ;)

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#73

Post by reitanqild »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #46
_abattoir wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When most people say "bullshit job", it seems to me like they really mean "job that could be solved by a well-built machine". Farming used to be a bullshit job until we built gigantic combines and automated watering systems and agricultural data storage systems, and now our farming problems are electronic, not logistic. (except for water, but that's another story.) So for the example of an actuary, ideally their job…

So for the example of an actuary, ideally their job would also be automated by an advanced program...If we took every actuary working 9 to 5, and instead threw all of their tens of thousands of daily working hours at coding a program to do their job... What, exactly, do you think actuaries do during their 9-5? Do you think they manually compute actuarial tables with a TI-89?

I personally see a lot of potential for automation, -just tonight I was out working for a non-profit that saves a lot of hassle because I learned them a few Excel tricks back in 2012.

Another place I was paid for less than 20 hours and it shaved two hours of preparations for the run of a machine, meaning they could keep it for several years more.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#74

Post by ddeck »

punee wrote: post #68
ddeck wrote: post #55

The entire asset management industry is a candidate for the bullshit job title. Within the equity asset class for example, aggregate performance is worse than passive investments and there is ample evidence that substantially all managers are unable to actually provide the service they are selling. As an industry, it effectively taxes savings and distributes those taxes to the employees within the industry, sometimes…

A critical assumption in that view is that the returns on actively and passively managed funds are independent. Are they, or are the passive funds freeriding on the work of the active funds?

They are certainly not independent given they are allocating between the same underlying investments, but I fail to see how they are freeriding given the data.

Many have looked at this and presented the data far more eloquently than I could:

https://hbr.org/2013/05/just-how-useless-is-the-asset/

http://www.umass.edu/preferen/You%20Must%20Read%20This/Malki...

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#75

Post by getdavidhiggins »

Form filling is like a muscle you have to flex. If you insulate yourself from the well oiled machine of the postal system for too long, it has a habit of reminding you of its presence. Usually this reminder comes when you least expect it. When you have a caffeine headache, when you cut down the enormous tree in the garden, when you've finished a Sudoku puzzle, or when you've just finished a lofty tome ― the letter will arrive when you have brain fog, and you better be prepared. This is why we have 'busy body' types who have nothing better to do than play with the postal system. They fill out those surveys you get to bulk up broadsheet newspapers, and send away for competitions. Their form filling muscle will not be allowed to atrophy.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#76

Post by jotm »

crdoconnor wrote: post #70
slyall wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every seen those ratings of countries as "Good places to do business"? Part of that is how well contracts are enforced and debts paid. Countries where it takes 10 years to force a company/person to pay a debt are not highly ranked and thus people are a lot less willing to do business or invest in them. Eg You little startup won't be able to lease office furniture if the hiring company doesn't think it can at least se…

Not only have I heard of it, I live in #1. Would you like a detailed list of reasons why it's not a list you want to be at the top of or would you rather take my word for it?

Please do list the reasons, I'm interested.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#77

Post by adventured »

littletimmy wrote: post #36
WalterBright wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's take Private Equity CEOs. The bottom line of what they do is try to reallocate capital away from less productive investments and towards more productive investments.

In general, you can make that sort of broad argument about anything. For example, you could say slavers were trying to reallocate labor from where it was less productive (African subsistence farming) to where it was more productive (building the American economy). The point being made here is whether Private Equity CEOs are contributing anything substantial apart from concentrating capital. The answer to that has to…

The answer does not have to be "no."

Private equity is one of the most valuable functions of a market based economy, and that's understating its importance. To say the head of a private equity firm serves no purpose, is to claim allocating private capital in a market economy needs nobody in charge of that process at the company doing it.

Nearly all venture capital is private equity. Sam Altman is the President of a private equity company.

Private equity is not about concentrating capital, it's about allocating capital to productive use. It's no more vile than the stock market, which allocates capital from investors during the IPO process and afterward through the common purchase of shares.

Further, your comparison about slavery is obviously entirely false. An angel investor - aka private equity investor - like say Mark Cuban, who owns his own investment company and is the head of it, is not performing a function similar to slavery. Mark's capital is his own, and it was not stolen from people held in slavery by force. There is no similarity, and one cannot simply say they're similar because slavers were re-allocating capital too, that would be an intentionally nonsensical comparison.

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#78

Post by bernardlunn »

crdoconnor wrote: post #70
slyall wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every seen those ratings of countries as "Good places to do business"? Part of that is how well contracts are enforced and debts paid. Countries where it takes 10 years to force a company/person to pay a debt are not highly ranked and thus people are a lot less willing to do business or invest in them. Eg You little startup won't be able to lease office furniture if the hiring company doesn't think it can at least se…

Not only have I heard of it, I live in #1. Would you like a detailed list of reasons why it's not a list you want to be at the top of or would you rather take my word for it?

Denmark?

Re: “So many people spend their working lives doing jobs they think are unnecessary”

#79

Post by notahacker »

crdoconnor wrote: post #49
_abattoir wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When most people say "bullshit job", it seems to me like they really mean "job that could be solved by a well-built machine". Farming used to be a bullshit job until we built gigantic combines and automated watering systems and agricultural data storage systems, and now our farming problems are electronic, not logistic. (except for water, but that's another story.) So for the example of an actuary, ideally their job…

>When most people say "bullshit job", it seems to me like they really mean "job that could be solved by a well-built machine". What Graeber seems to mean is jobs that serve the interests of some people at the expense of others and overall contribute very little, nothing, or actively work against the interests of society at large.

That is what Graeber aims to describe - he's even specifically written about how technology has undermined "meaningful" employment in agriculture and manufacturing - but the problem is his arguments against "bullshit jobs" conflate jobs which don't serve society with jobs whose employees feel they're worthless because they much preferred being poet-musicians. The latter argument, and Graeber's vision of "Hell is a collection of individuals who are spending the bulk of their time working on a task they don’t like and are not especially good at" are extremely susceptible to precisely the "lack of perspective' criticism raised by the OP. And unlike Graeber, I've met corporate lawyers who chose that line of work because they found it interesting and valuable (and I'd hazard the corporate lawyers that draft the worst contract terms and push the hardest for unnecessary litigation really enjoy their jobs)

Sitting in a corporate cubicle churning out CRUD apps on spec for customers you're isolated from probably feels like it's contributing less to society than co-founding a "change the world" startup that fails to achieve product market fit, but the former probably achieves more good for society, even if it's only the sort of good that involves people having to do less paperwork manually...

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