In the early twentieth century, people prophesied that technology would see us all working fifteen-hour weeks and driving flying cars. Instead, something curious happened. Not only have the flying cars not materialised, but average working hours have increased rather than decreased. And now, across the developed world, three-quarters of all jobs are in services, finance or admin: jobs that don't seem to contribute anything to society. In Bullshit Jobs, David Graeber explores how this phenomenon - one more associated with the Soviet Union, but which capitalism was supposed to eliminate - has happened. In doing so, he looks at how, rather than producing anything, 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. 

This book is for anyone whose heart has sunk at the sight of a whiteboard, who believes 'workshops' should only be for making things, or who just suspects that there might be a better way to run our world.


在二十世紀初，人們預言技術將使我們所有人都工作十五週，駕駛飛行汽車。相反，一些奇怪的事情發生了。不僅飛行汽車沒有實現，而且平均工作時間增加而不是減少。而現在，在發達國家，四分之三的工作崗位都是服務，財務或管理：那些似乎對社會沒有任何貢獻的工作。在Bullshit Jobs中，David Graeber探討了這種現象 - 一種與蘇聯，但資本主義應該消除 - 已經發生了。在這樣做的過程中，他著眼於如何，而不是生產任何東西，工作本身已成為目的;這種工作如何維持當前破碎的金融資本體系;以及最後，我們如何擺脫它。

這本書適合那些看到白板時心就沉沒的人，他們認為“工作坊”只應該用於製作東西，或者只是懷疑可能有更好的方式來管理我們的世界。

（譯者/徐琍沂&劉世明）