Search
Study at Cambridge
Undergraduate
Courses
Apply
Events and open days
Fees and finance
Postgraduate
Postgraduate courses
Apply
Fees and funding
Postgraduate events
International students
Professional and continuing education
Executive and professional education
Courses in education
About the University
How the University and Colleges work
Term dates
History
Map
Visiting the University
News
Annual reports
A global university
Equality and diversity
Events
Public engagement
Jobs
Give to Cambridge
Research at Cambridge
For Cambridge students
For staff
For alumni
For our researchers
Business and enterprise
Colleges and Departments
Give to Cambridge
Libraries
Museums and collections
Home
Research
News
One in twenty workers are in ‘useless’ jobs – far fewer than previously thought
Research
Research home
News
Our people
About research
About research overview
Animal research
Animal research overview
Overseeing animal research
Overseeing animal research overview
The Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Body
Animal welfare and ethics
What types of animal do we use?
What types of animal do we use? overview
Chickens
Guinea pigs
Equine species
Mice
Naked mole-rats
Non-human primates (marmosets)
Other birds
Rats
Sheep
Xenopus
Zebrafish
Non-technical summaries
Animal Welfare Policy
Animal Welfare Policy overview
Concordat on Openness on Animal Research
Alternatives to animal use
FAQs
Further information
Research culture
Research culture overview
Narrative CVs project
Open research
Strategic Initiatives & Networks
Interdisciplinary Research Centres
Energy sector partnerships
Nobel Prize
Horizons magazine
Research integrity
Research integrity overview
Statement
Reports
Advisory panel
Advisory panel overview
Procedures
Resources
Resources overview
Good Research Practice guidance
Good Research Practice guidance overview
Good Research Practice checklist
Guidelines on authorship
Citing blogs as reference sources
Research misconduct
Business and enterprise
Our impact
One in twenty workers are in ‘useless’ jobs – far fewer than previously thought
The so-called ‘bullshit jobs theory’ – which argues that a large and rapidly increasing number of workers are undertaking jobs that they themselves recognise as being useless and of no social value – contains several major flaws, argue researchers from the universities of Cambridge and Birmingham.
Although the data doesn’t always support David Graeber’s claims, his insightful and imaginative work played an important role in raising awareness of the harms of useless jobs
Brendan Burchell
Even so, writing in
Work, Employment and Society
, the academics applaud its proponent, American anthropologist David Graeber, who died in September 2020, for highlighting the link between a sense of purpose in one’s job and psychological wellbeing.
Graeber initially put forward the concept of ‘bullshit jobs’ – jobs that even those who do them view as worthless – in his 2013 essay The Democracy Project. He further expanded this theory in his 2018 book Bullshit Jobs: A Theory, looking at possible reasons for the existence of such jobs.
Jobs that Graeber described as bullshit (BS) jobs range from doormen and receptionists to lobbyists and public relations specialists through to those in the legal profession, particularly corporate lawyers and legal consultants.
Dr Magdalena Soffia from the University of Cambridge and the What Works Centre for Wellbeing, one of the authors of the article, said: “There’s something appealing about the bullshit jobs theory. The fact that many people have worked in such jobs at some point may explain why Graeber’s work resonates with so many people who can relate to the accounts he gives. But his theory is not based on any reliable empirical data, even though he puts forward several propositions, all of which are testable.”
To test Graeber’s propositions, the researchers turned to the 2005–2015 European Working Conditions Surveys (EWCS), examining reasons that led to respondents answering ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ to the statement: ‘I have the feeling of doing useful work’. The surveys – taken in 2005, 2010 and 2015 – gather measures on the usefulness of the job, workers’ wellbeing and objective data on the quality of work. The number of respondents grew from over 21,000 in 2005 to almost 30,000 in 2015.
According to Graeber, somewhere between 20% and 50% of the workforce – possibly as many as 60% - are employed in BS jobs. Yet the EWCS found that just 4.8% of EU workers said they did not feel they were doing useful work. The figure was slightly higher in the UK and Ireland, but still only 5.6% of workers.
Graeber also claimed that the number of BS jobs has been ‘increasing rapidly in recent years’, despite presenting no empirical evidence. Again the researchers found no evidence to support this conjecture – in fact, the percentage of people in BS jobs fell from 7.8% in 2005 to just 4.8% in 2015 – exactly the opposite of Graeber’s prediction.
His next hypothesis was that BS jobs are concentrated in particular professions, such as finance, law, administration and marketing, and largely absent in others, such as those linked to public services and manual labour. “Many service workers hate their jobs; but even those who do are aware that what they do does make some sort of meaningful difference in the world . . . [Whereas] we can only assume that any office worker who one might suspect secretly believes themselves to have a bullshit job does, indeed, believe this,” he wrote.
When the researchers ranked the occupations by the proportion of people who rated their job as rarely or never useful, they found no evidence for the existence of occupations in which the majority of workers feel their work is not useful.
The authors found that workers in some occupations, such as teachers and nurses, generally see themselves as doing useful jobs, while sales workers are above average in the proportion rating their job as not useful (7.7%). Even so, most of the results contradict Graeber’s assertion. For example, legal professionals and administration professionals are all low on this ranking, and jobs that Graeber rates as being examples of essential non-BS jobs, such as refuse collectors (9.7%) and cleaners and helpers (8.1%), are high on this scale.
Not everything that Graeber suggested was wrong, however. He argued, for example, that BS jobs are a form of ‘spiritual violence’ that lead to anxiety, depression and misery among workers. The team found strong evidence between the perception of one’s job as useless and an individual’s psychological wellbeing, albeit a correlation rather than necessarily a causal link. In the UK in 2015, workers who felt their job was not useful scored significantly lower on the World Health Organisation Well-Being Index than those who felt they were doing useful work (a mean average of 49.3 compared with 64.5). There was a similar gap across other EU nations.
Dr Alex Wood from the University of Birmingham said: “When we looked at readily-available data from a large cohort of people across Europe, it quickly became apparent to us that very few of the key propositions in Graeber’s theory can be sustained – and this is the case in every country we looked at, to varying degrees. But one of his most important propositions – that BS jobs are a form of ‘spiritual violence’ – does seem to be supported by the data.”
Given that, in absolute terms, a substantial number of people do not view their jobs as useful, what then leads to this feeling? The team found that those individuals who felt respected and encouraged by management were less likely to report their work as useless. Conversely, when employees experience management that is disrespectful, inefficient or poor at giving feedback, they were less likely to perceive their work as useful.
Similarly, individuals who saw their job as useful tended to be able to use their own ideas at work – an important element for feeling that your job provides you with the ability to make the most of your skills – was correlated with a perception of usefulness. There was a clear relationship between the extent to which people felt that they had enough time to do their job well and their rating of the usefulness of their job, suggesting that one source of feeling a job to be useless is the pace at which one is working, affecting the ability to realise one’s potential and capabilities. Other factors correlated with feeling that a job was worthwhile included support by managers and colleagues and the ability to influence important decisions and the direction of an organization.
Professor Brendan Burchell from the University of Cambridge said: “Although the data doesn’t always support David Graeber’s claims, his insightful and imaginative work played an important role in raising awareness of the harms of useless jobs. He may have been way off the mark with regards how common BS jobs are, but he was right to link people’s attitudes towards their jobs to their psychological wellbeing, and this is something that employers – and society as a whole – should take seriously.
“Most importantly, employees need to be respected and valued if they in turn are to value – and benefit psychologically as well as financially from – their jobs.”
Reference
Soffia, M, Wood, AJ and Burchell, B.
Alienation Is Not ‘Bullshit’: An Empirical Critique of Graeber’s Theory of BS Jobs.
WES; 3 June 2021; DOI: 10.1177/09500170211015067
The text in this work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified.  All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – as here, on our
main website
under its
Terms and conditions
, and on a
range of channels including social media
that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.
Read this next
Cambridge to Careers: skills and support that take you further
Cambridge Enterprise driving spinout success
Cambridge to Careers: How I returned to Middlesbrough to work for the Mayor
No evidence ADHD is being over-diagnosed, say experts
Published
03 Jun 2021
Share this page
Share on Bluesky
Share by email
Share on Facebook
Share on LinkedIn
Share on Reddit
Share on WhatsApp
Share on X
Image
Man working at a laptop
Credit:
Bermix Studio
Search research
Keyword search
Go
Sign up to receive our weekly research email
Our selection of the week's biggest Cambridge research news sent directly to your inbox. Enter your email address, confirm you're happy to receive our emails and then select 'Subscribe'.
Email
I wish to receive a weekly Cambridge research news summary by email.
The University of Cambridge will use your email address to send you our weekly research news email. We are committed to protecting your personal information and being transparent about what information we hold. Please read our
email privacy notice
for details.
Subjects
Work
employment
Mental health
business
People
Brendan Burchell
Magdalena Soffia
Places
School of the Humanities and Social Sciences
Department of Sociology
Related organisations
University of Birmingham
Connect with us
Facebook
Instagram
LinkedIn
X
YouTube
© 2026 University of Cambridge
Contact the University
Accessibility statement
Freedom of information
Privacy policy and cookies
Statement on Modern Slavery
Terms and conditions
University A-Z
Study at Cambridge
Undergraduate
Postgraduate
Professional and continuing education
Executive and professional education
About the University
How the University and Colleges work
Give to Cambridge
Jobs
Maps
Visiting the University
Cambridge University Press & Assessment
Research at Cambridge
Research news
About research at Cambridge
Public engagement