Final Working Definition: 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.
pages 9-10, chapter titled “What Is a Bullshit Job?”
Ending the month of March with another non-fiction title. Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber is a text that asks the fundamental question of “does your job make a meaningful contribution to the world?.
The book does this by starting with defining what a bullshit job is. From there it talks about different kinds of bullshit jobs, proposing five major varieties – flunkies, goons, duct tapers, box tickets, and taskmasters. After this it talks about the conditions of such jobs and the social, political and psychological effects of bullshit jobs. The book ends with a proposed solution to the problems outlined: Universal Basic Income (UBI).
The book touches on various concepts such as “managerial feudalism” which Graeber describes as a recreation of feudal power structures within capitalist systems. Specifically the proliferation of middle managers and other intermediaries who treat their subordinates as lords of old would treat their vassals.
It also tackles the concept of “caring labour” a term defined by feminists. Graeber asserts that caring labour is ultimately the real commodity in our current labour system as workers are supposed to be doing large amounts of caring labour for a class of people who don’t care and don’t perform said labour (the capitalist).
“Caring labor” is generally seen as work directed at other people, and it always involves a certain labor of interpretation, empathy, and understanding. To some degree, one might argue that this is not really work at all, it’s just life, or life lived properly–humans are naturally empathetic creatures, and to communicate with one another at all, we must constantly cast ourselves imaginatively into each other’s shoes and try to understand what others are thinking and feeling, which usually means caring about them at least a little–but it very much becomes work when all the empathy and imaginative identification is on one side.
pages 236-237, chapter titled Why Do We as a Society Not Object to the Growth of Pointless Employment?
I found this book a easy read, the structure of the book is well though out. Graeber is a good writer who doesn’t descend into the depths of academic theory in his writing despite being an academic himself. The book occasionally takes on a almost wry, funny tone in its writing which is a much needed source of comic relief from the depressing subject matter.