Bullshit Jobs: The Rise of Pointless Work, and What We Can Do About It

Back in 1930, the economist John Maynard Keynes prophesied that by the century’s end, technology would see us all working fifteen-hour weeks. But instead, something curious happened. Today, average working hours have not decreased, but increased. And now, across the developed world, three-quarters of all jobs are in services or admin, jobs that don’t seem to add anything to society- bullshit jobs. In Bullshit Jobs, David Graeber explores how this phenomenon – one more associated with the 20th-century Soviet Union, but which capitalism was supposed to eliminate – has happened. In doing so, he looks at how we value work, and how, rather than being productive, work has become an end in itself; the way such work maintains the current broken system of finance capital; and, finally, how we can get out of it.

Format: Paperback
Pages: 368
Imprint: Penguin Books Ltd
Publication date: 07/02/2019