School of Social and Political Science

Description

Title: An Empirical Scrutiny of Graeber’s Useless Jobs Hypothesis

Abstract:

David Graeber’s ‘bullshit jobs theory’ has generated a great deal of academic and public interest. This theory holds that a large and rapidly increasing number of workers are undertaking jobs that they recognise as being useless and of no social value. Despite generating clear testable hypotheses, this theory is not based on robust empirical research. This presentation will use representative data from the EU to test some of its core hypotheses. The perception of doing useless work is strongly associated with poor wellbeing, but our findings contradict the main propositions of Graeber’s theory. The proportion of employees describing their jobs as useless is low and declining and bears little relationship to Graber’s predictions. Marx’s concept of alienation and a ‘Work Relations’ approach inspire an alternative account that highlights poor management and toxic workplace environments in explaining why workers perceive paid work as useless. The presentation also asks how come a theory with so little empirical support became so influential.