Books/Bullshit Jobs

Subtitle: A theory

Author: David Graeber

Summary

Introduction

In 2013, the author wrote an article for the magazine Strike! entitled “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs” which went viral. The article was translated into multiple languages. There were surveys done in various countries to determine what percentage of the population considered their jobs to be bullshit. Some people took out ads and posted quotes from the article in public places. In addition to the surveys, the author also reached out to collect testimonials from people on their bullshit jobs. The article is fully reproduced in the introduction of the book. This book expands on the article.

Definition

This is the final working definition of a "bullshit job" that the author comes up with:

a bullshit job is a form of paid employment that is so completely pointless, unnecessary, or pernicious that even the employee cannot justify its existence even though, as part of the conditions of employment, the employee feels obliged to pretend that this is not the case.

The worker's perspective is given the highest priority in determining whether a job is bullshit or not. This definition is thus subjective. Instead of judging a job itself as bullshit from an outsider's perspective, it is better to let the workers themselves decide. The author avoids categorizing existing established jobs as bullshit jobs.

A bullshit job is different from a "shit job" which is just a job that is bad, pays badly and the worker is treated badly. The important difference is that shit jobs aren't pointless like bullshit jobs. The author cites the abusive treatment of cleaning staff at his university as an example of a shit job.

While the Soviet Union with its policy of full employment produced a lot of unnecessary blue collar jobs, the current political ideology of neoliberalism is producing a lot of white collar bullshit jobs. There are some aspects of many jobs that seem to be bullshit, but this book is limited to dealing with jobs that are entirely bullshit. Hair dressers and Mafia hitmen are not bullshit jobs.

The 5 categories of Bullshit Jobs

The author assembled a database of over 250 testimonies from online discussions and by actively soliciting online. He then categorized them into 5 major categories. However, there could be jobs that might have aspects of multiple categories. Also, some jobs might transition from one category to another based on the boss's whims.

Flunkies

a.k.a "fedual retainers" or people forming the entourage of someone to make them look more important. In modern times, we can see examples like doormen, concierge and lift operators. A Dutch publishing company appointed a receptionist with not much to do to look like a legitimate company. Apparently, your company ain't legit unless there are 3 levels of hierarchy. Many assistant jobs only exist to make the person seem more important to others. Some flunkies essentially do their boss's job for them.

Bullshit jobs also end up creating unnecessary processes to justify their existence. In the Soviet Union, one had to go through three clerks to buy a loaf of bread. In modern German military, moving a soldier's computer from one room to another (5 meters) requires the involvement of three levels of subcontractors and a day of full-time work for two people.

Goons

Goons have an aggressive or manipulative element in their job function. The jobs in the national armed forces, lobbying, PR, advertising, telemarketing and corporate law are only justified because the competition has them. Marketing, advertising and publicity are required to manipulate people and produce artificial demand. A lot of jobs in telemarketing are not even neutral, they produce negative outcomes for people.

Duct Tapers

These jobs involve using manual work to make a non-functional system appear to be working. Duct tape jobs are bullshit jobs because they shouldn't have existed if the system or automation was working as intended. They might have a productive output though. The author cites an example where his university employed an apologist for their carpenter because of his busy schedule instead of just appointing another carpenter.

Box Tickers

Box ticker jobs enable organizations to have some task done on paper but not in real life. A case of confusing the map for the terrain. Private companies also engage in box ticking, to convince themselves that they are doing something that they are supposed to do, but not really doing it.

Task Masters

A type 1 task master is an unnecessary superior. This type can be considered harmless if the task master is aware of it and doesn't get in the way of people doing productive work. Unnecessary middle management is the best example. Excessive supervision motivated by Taylorism could be a reason for this.

A type 2 task master is a bullshit task generator. An Academic Dean at a British university was assigned 3 people to carry out her bullshit job. Sometimes, when organizations cannot fire someone for incompetence, they have to make up an entire bullshit job with an unrelated job description, hire someone and then assign them the tasks of the incompetent/non-working person. If the former person returns to performing their job properly, then the organization ends up with a bullshit job that they can't get rid of.

Some bullshit jobs could be combinations of the categories. A telemarketer (goon) who makes others do box-ticking. A flak-catcher is a powerless job whose job is to receive complaints and apologize. Someone young and innocent is appointed for flak-catcher jobs so that they are less likely to be harmed by angry customers.

There are second-order bullshit jobs, where the jobs themselves seem productive (like house-keeping or electricians), but the enterprise they're part of is itself bullshit. If these are also added up, the number of bullshit jobs goes up from 37% to over 50%.

Review

I don't think the author has any understanding of the software industry. His definition of Duct Tapers would include all software architects and Cloud solutions architects. Generally most software development these days is so high-level that it would easily fit in his duct tapers category. I agree with Pablo's testimonial, but for software duct tape jobs to be bullshit jobs, there should be a certain futility about them with a corresponding lack of value to society. Also, the author (or the editor) doesn't know the difference between free software and freeware.