Bullshit Jobs - Book Discussion Questions

Transcript

1. Boundless Book Club
   Think-boundless.com
   “Bullshit Jobs”
   By David Graeber
   September 2018
   

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2. 2
   Welcome!
   ➢This is the first book club I’ve run!
   ➢Excited to hear open discussion
   and ideas
   ➢This conversation is meant to be
   provocative and also exploring
   with some taboo ideas. Let’s
   default to curiosity instead of
   “here is why this can’t work.”
   

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3. 3
   Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber
   ➢Longform article in 2013
   ➢Turned into a book in 2018
   ➢Graeber is an anthropologist and
   self-proclaimed “anarchist”
   ➢This is a book about the
   “psychological, social, and political
   effects” of the current system NOT
   a prescription for the future
   

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4. Ten topics
   #1 Bullshit Jobs Definitions & Estimates
   #2 Five Types of BS Jobs
   #3 “Shit” Jobs & Equal Pay Argument
   #4 From fried locusts to the “time famine”
   #5 Three types of unpaid labor
   #6 Public Sector vs. Private Sector
   #7 Service Economy? Or Not?
   #8 Politics: Obsessed with Jobs?
   #9 Brief History of Labor & Economics
   #10 The Answer: Oprah gives everyone $$?
   

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5. 5
   “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 that this is not the case”
   DEFINITION
   

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6. 6
   Have you ever had a “bullshit
   job” as Graeber defines it?
   What was it like?
   QUESTION
   

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7. Claim: Half our economy is “bullshit”
   “In no sense am I denying that the bullshitization of all aspects of
   the economy is a critically important social issue. Simply consider
   the figures cited earlier. If 37 percent to 40 percent of jobs are
   completely pointless, and at least 50 percent of the work done
   in nonpointless office jobs is equally pointless, we can probably
   conclude that at least half of all work being done in our society
   could be eliminated without making any real difference at all.”
   7
   

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8. Claim: Half our economy is “bullshit”
   “In no sense am I denying that the bullshitization of all aspects of
   the economy is a critically important social issue. Simply consider
   the figures cited earlier. If 37 percent to 40 percent of jobs are
   completely pointless, and at least 50 percent of the work done
   in nonpointless office jobs is equally pointless, we can probably
   conclude that at least half of all work being done in our society
   could be eliminated without making any real difference at all.”
   8
   →Too high, too low or about right?
   

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9. Five Types Of BS Jobs
   9
   1
   Flunkies
   “I have X people
   working for me”
   2
   Goons
   Advertising,
   telemarketing, PR
   3
   Duct Tapers
   Fixing pointless
   problems
   4
   Box Ticker
   Beautiful reports,
   reality on paper
   5
   Task Master
   Assigning work to
   other people
   

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10. 10
    "typically involve work that needs
    to be done and is clearly of benefit
    to society; its just that the workers
    who do them are paid and
    treated badly“
    • Data Point: Oxfam estimates that 41
    million people in are earning below
    $12 an hour—below the
    poveAmericarty threshold for a family
    of four, even working 40 hours a
    week.
    Shit jobs:
    

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11. 11
    “It’s commonplace to hear that grade
    school or middle school teachers
    shouldn’t be paid well, or certainly not as
    well as lawyers or executives, because
    one wouldn’t want people motivated
    primarily by greed to be teaching
    children. The argument would make a
    certain amount of sense if it were
    applied consistently—but it never is. (I
    have yet to hear anyone make the
    same argument about doctors.)”
    Exceptions: Doctor is
    not a “shit job”
    

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12. Equal Income Argument
    G. A. Cohen
    12
    1. Gifted people already receive a benefit by being gifted
    2. Some people are biologically wired for “hard work” (a natural gift again)
    3. Even if some worked harder than others, would need to know if it was
    altruistic or selfish
    4. If altruistic, doesn’t make sense to give them more rewards. It would only
    make sense to reward “selfish”.
    5. Since motives shift, you cannot simply divide selfish and altruists. Thus, it
    makes better moral sense to frustrate the egoists.
    6. Thus it does not make sense to reward greater “effort” or productivity
    

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13. Question: If we were
    designing an economy from
    scratch and would set
    salaries, who would make the
    most?
    13
    

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14. A history of time
    14
    14th Century – Clock Towers
    17th Century – Mass Adoption (Pocket Watches)
    “spending time” vs “passing time”
    17th Century Religion – “Husbandry” Of Time
    Good use of time = moral goodness
    18th/19th Century – Social Problem
    Poor seen as lacking “time discipline”
    20th/21st Century – Optimization
    “time famine” / optimize time
    

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15. In Madagascar time might be
    measured by “a rice-cooking”
    (about half an hour) or “the
    frying of a locust” (a moment).
    - Time, Work-Discipline and
    Industrial Capitalism”, by E.P.
    Thompson
    15
    Fried locusts
    

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16. Leslie Perlow coined the phrase “time
    famine” in 1999
    “a feeling of having too much to do
    and not enough time to do”
    16
    →Can time be “spent”? What do you
    think?
    →How does our mindset of time
    being finite impact how we
    approach our lives?
    

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17. Three Ignored Types Of Unpaid Labor
    17
    Emotional Labor: Study of air hostesses and need to be “perky,
    empathetic, good natured” lead to feelings of “emptiness” and
    “depression”
    Interpretive Labor: Needing to constantly understand and
    translate the intentions of someone “higher up” in an
    organization
    Caring Labor: Stay at home parents, caring for sick, elderly or
    loved ones, helping out in the community
    

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18. Public Sector
    18
    Private Sector
    +66% managers
    and administrators
    at universities
    +135% managers
    and administrators
    at universities
    Is private sector really that efficient?
    Do we need these jobs? Yes/No?
    

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19. Do we need
    these jobs?
    Yes/No?
    19
    

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20. Do we
    really
    have a
    growing
    service
    economy?
    20
    

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21. 21
    Common Ground: Jobs?
    “Everybody who supports single-payer health care says, ‘Look at all
    this money we would be saving from insurance and paperwork.’ That
    represents one million, two million, three million jobs [filled by]
    people who are working at Blue Cross Blue Shield or Kaiser or other
    places. What are we doing with them? Where are we employing
    them?”
    Who said it?
    

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22. A brief history of labor
    22
    16th Century – Guilds & Apprenticeships
    Work seen as transformative for young men
    17th – 19th Century – Guilds fall apart
    Religion - work is punishment & redemptive
    19th Century – Gospel Of Work / Producerism
    Carlyle: Labor be viewed as essence of life itself
    19th Century – Reaction to Producerism
    Work is divine because it is source of wealth
    ((Luddism, Chartism, Riccardian, Adam Smith)
    1861 – “Labor Theory Of Value” accepted
    Lincoln: “labor is prior to &independent of capital”
    BUT assumes workers eventually become owners
    

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23. A brief history of labor part 2
    23
    Late 1800s – Reactionary Economic Theories
    Labor theories: Marx, Ingersoll, Kearney
    Late 1800s – Work still tied to “public benefit”
    Law: Could only get LLC if proved benefit
    1890s – “Gospel Of Wealth” (Carnegie, et al…)
    Capitalists argue capital over Labor
    Early 20th Century – Shift to consumerism
    Still rooted in “managerialist” approach –
    balancing benefit of multiple stakeholders
    1970s – “Shareholder value” / Friedman
    “One social responsibility of business…to increase
    profits”
    

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24. Wealth
    Creation Is
    A New Idea
    “As Karl Marx once pointed out:
    prior to the industrial revolution,
    it never seems to have
    occurred to anyone to write a
    book asking what conditions
    would create the most overall
    wealth. ”
    

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25. Wages have
    become
    dethatched
    from profits
    

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26. Universally Basic Income: The
    Only Solution?
    26
    Some benefits/reasons:
    • Way to re-distribute hidden work: we still do work for machines (e.g.
    when using facebook, we are helping train their advertising
    algorithm)
    • Applies universally – no free loaders
    • Does not take away incentive to work (at least one what people want
    to work on)
    • Simplified social safety net (1,000s of programs => single program)
    

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27. Universal
    Basic
    Income
    Are you on Board?
    27
    

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28. Thank you!
    I am fascinated by the changing
    dynamics in the workplace – or perhaps
    the fact that the dynamics don’t seem to
    be changing.
    I want to help imagine a more sane
    future of work and this book discussion
    is my attempt to help raise some of the
    tougher questions.
    I’d love to hear from anyone that wants
    to have a conversation about any of
    these ideas.
    Paul Millerd
    Creator & Freelance Consultant
    Boundless: The Human Side
    Of Work
    CONTACT ME
    → E-MAIL ME
    → WRITING
    → PODCAST
    → CONSULTING
    

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