To ask what jobs people secretly (or not so secretly) look down on and why?

[ForBreezySloth]

We’re always told “all work is valuable” and I do agree in principle, but if we’re honest, most of us have a job or two we side-eye, even if we don’t say it out loud. Is it how people behave in the role? The pay vs attitude? The ethics of the job itself?

AIBU to think it’s okay to admit we have judgements - as long as we’re willing to examine them?

With the parking wardens I knew (when I worked in a local authority)

• because they needed "a job" and didn't have time or luxury of waiting for their "dream career"
• because a job in a local authority is secure and comes with a decent pension and scope to progress or move into different areas

For all sorts of reasons, not everyone has the luxury of waiting for their dream job to come along. Plus you have bills to pay and you are made redundant, I would say it's far more impressive to go out and get a job where you may face abuse than it is to sit around claiming benefits/living off your spouse while you wait from your perfect job to come along

@yikesnotagain
@TempestTost

I know what you’re getting at, but no company is going to pay someone just to keep them busy, if they weren’t adding any value to the business.
Some jobs do just exist to help a company make money, rather than directly benefitting society the way doctors/teachers etc do. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing, we need businesses for a healthy economy. And if a business exists in the first place, then there must be a need for its products/services. Nobody is going to pay for a product or a service they don’t need. And if there’s no need or demand, then they’d go out of business pretty fast.
Some jobs are more strategic and all about making decisions, overseeing other people’s work, advising, and facilitating communication between different people and departments, rather than being on the front line serving customers etc.
(I don’t have this kind of job btw so I’ve no skin in the game, just an observation!)

Influencers and politicians - pretty much for the same reasons!

It's insidious here on MN. People will often refer to working in retail or hospitality "whilst at uni", lest anyone think they actually worked in those fields as a career.

Yes my statement could have come across that way. I probably didn’t word what I wanted to say clearly enough. In my entirely imaginary scenario I probably should have said that I was suggesting that people should experience (instead of saying have to do) certain jobs for six months. They would obviously be under the supervision of the people who know how to do the actual job but would experience the role. If people had experience and some understanding of the roles they wouldn’t look down on such jobs hopefully? As I said on a previous thread a lot of people think they know what teaching involves because they went to school. So I understand where you are coming from but that was definitely not my intention.

I agree, carers are absolute saints. They helped me deal with my elderly and stubborn mum, and kept me from exploding at her. They often came from distant countries, and their homes in the UK were far from mine. During lockdown, chatting with them when they came in, listening to their stories, contributed to my sanity. And they are paid pittance. PITTANCE!

I don’t really understand what is wrong with earning well and being a fundraiser. Surely people that are raising huge funds for charities deserve to be earning a decent wage- It’s a job not many people could do or would want to do, I know I couldn’t.

But I agree there are some absolutely vile fundraisers who are coercive and aggressive, which my partner despises too and would report. It’s a shame that they ruin it for others who genuinely care.

Ok going to add aesthetic practitioners, but are really beauticians who should be doing nails and waxing. Not pumping god knows what into people at £££ a go. I think it’s about time this industry was regulated? Hard working women are being conned out of their money. The list of treatments go on and on and we didn’t know they existed 5+ years ago, let alone needed it.

Hard working women aren’t being conned out of their money if they’re deciding to go and get it done? They’re the daft ones if they’re letting someone with new or vague qualifications do it to them. It’s not a con. It’s just stupidity.

@KaleQueen stupidity, but also the patriarchy and awful teaching of critical thinking skills.
I don’t have loads of sympathy for women who get themselves pumped full of filler and fake Botox, and now even some men are doing it too. I think it’s an educational failure.

I know someone who gave up her paramedic job to be an aesthetic practitioner. Now her SM is full of off plump lips and smooth foreheads.