Will AI Bring Fewer Jobs or Just More “Bullshit Jobs”?
The rise of AI and automation has sparked a debate: Will these technologies eliminate jobs and lead to widespread unemployment, or transform work into something new? This debate often focuses on a functional perspective of jobs, with an assumption that jobs primarily exist to meet specific needs, and when AI fulfills these needs, there will be no need for those jobs. OK, some jobs may perish due to AI. But is this very assumption correct? Do jobs really exist to fulfill needs? Anthropologist David Graeber,* who wrote the influential book Bullshit Jobs,** would not agree with that assumption. He believes that jobs are often created not out of necessity, but to uphold systems of power, and give the illusion of economic productivity.
In fact, the debate about losing jobs due to technology is not a new one. As Graeber noted in Bullshit Jobs, “In the year 1930, John Maynard Keynes predicted that, by century’s end, technology would have advanced sufficiently that countries like Great Britain or the United States would have achieved a fifteen-hour work week. There’s every reason to believe he was right. In technological terms, we are quite capable of this.”
Here we are in 2024, still far from achieving the fifteen-hour work week. We’re also far from Keynes’s optimism, as instead of discussing fewer working hours (which never materialized), we’re now worrying about fewer jobs. This pessimism might indeed be justified. I’m not sure if Graeber would be more optimistic today, but his ideas remain compelling. He argued that modern economies haven’t used technological advancements to reduce human labor but have instead created a proliferation of jobs that serve no meaningful purpose—what he called 'bullshit jobs.' These roles, such as corporate lawyers or PR consultants (examples Graeber frequently cites—so don’t blame me), may not be necessary for society but persist due to systemic inefficiencies and political structures that prioritize employment for its own sake.
Please don’t consider Graeber a snob who thinks that some professions are less meaningful than his own as an anthropology professor. If you’re curious about his ideology, he is known to be an anarchist and a leading figure in Occupy Wall Street. Instead, he refers to experiences of individuals who feel their work contributes little to society. This phenomenon, he argues, constitutes a form of "psychological violence" on those workers, trapping them in a cycle of dissatisfaction and purposelessness.
So why do we have the jobs Graeber calls “bullshit”? “The answer clearly isn’t economic: it’s moral and political,” Graeber writes. “The ruling class has figured out that a happy and productive population with free time on their hands is a mortal danger.” In other words, the structure of capitalism doesn’t just demand jobs to meet societal needs—it demands jobs to maintain control, purpose, and the illusion of productivity.
If Graeber is right, we don’t need to worry about mass unemployment caused by AI—because society will simply invent more “bullshit jobs” to keep people busy. Think about it: even as automation takes over factories, new industries emerge, not all of them essential according to Graeber. So, we don’t need to rely on the possibility of new “needs” that will emerge; even without a need or serving any real purpose, new jobs arise, and thousands are being employed this way. Perhaps, instead, we should be more worried about greater illusion, dissatisfaction, and purposelessness.
OK, this may sound a bit satirical, but if Graeber’s thesis holds true, humanity has an impressive capacity to create new work, meaningful or not. If jobs are lost to AI, we’ll likely compensate by inventing new ones, perhaps even more detached from real needs. If the very mechanism of employment were based on human needs, Keynes’s prediction would come true, and workers would have more time to enjoy their lives—because time to rest and enjoy life is a real need.
*David Graeber (1961–2020) was a renowned anthropologist, social theorist, and activist. He authored influential works such as Bullshit Jobs and Debt: The First 5,000 Years. Graeber was celebrated for his sharp critiques of capitalism and his exploration of how societal structures shape work, value, and freedom.
**About Bullshit Jobs
Published in 2018, Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber examines the rise of meaningless work in modern economies. Graeber argues that many jobs exist solely to maintain economic systems rather than fulfill societal needs, leading to widespread dissatisfaction and what he calls "psychological violence."
Note: This blog post was developed with the assistance of AI (ChatGPT-4o). All ideas and arguments are my own, while the text was refined using AI as a tool for drafting and editing.
