On bullshit jobs, again

David Graeber's (LSE) silly stuff on bullshit jobs is making the rounds again. I wrote about it already back when he came up with this. Graeber is a good guy and he wrote some interesting things on debt and topics in anthropology. Bad sadly he has become one of those folks who think that because they are smart in their field they know about everything.

Many of the jobs Graeber describes as bullshit - in admin, customer services, etc. - are only bullshit if you don't have any clue about running an organisation, if you don't understand anything about customer service, and so on. Graeber doesn't seem to have much first hand experience in doing these things (I don't doubt that he has read up on them, done interviews, but that's not the same). Like many academics he doesn't see nor does he take the time to learn about how the institutions he is/was working. If he would have to do a tiny fraction of all the things a university needs to do for its students to stay afloat these days he would go nuts and wouldn't have any time to write books about how these same jobs are meaningless. Think of organising exams, making sure students all get the same quality of services for the same money, sorting out the legal and financial issues of an institution and so on.

One could of course say that we should drastically cut back on admin and management positions. That's possible but then companies and public institutions won't be able to serve people. We are not in 1800 anymore, the population numbers are through the roof. The number of people attending higher education institutions, using banks, shopping, traveling, etc. has increased by several magnitudes.

To give just one example, no country could have broadened its higher ed system and admitted more students to more courses if there wouldn't be a professional administration to deal with the issues connected to this and an efficient and competent management to oversee and organise this.

Graeber is right that management, especially in competitive for profit sectors, takes a view that helps maintain a bad social track we are on towards inequality. But the solution is not to create nicer jobs or to banish ones he feels are useless. The solution is to change redistribution patterns. Yes, we might be able to work less, but no, we don't want to give up on quality standards in education, food processing, banking, we don't want to live without audits for government institutions, social services, car making, iron and steel production, etc.

Second, just because a job doesn't change the world and is not crucial to our survival, it isn't bullshit. It's not a bad thing that we don't all have to work on the fields every day just to have enough food for our community to survive a cold winter. Or that we don't all have to participate in war planning or other such activities which have a big impact and high intensity.

There are plenty of jobs that won't change the world, but they make it the more and more safe and increasingly convenient and pleasant place that it is becoming, at least in terms of services and support we get. This enables us to do a lot more with our free time and also in our jobs if we chose to do something creative.