Loving Your Job Is a Capitalist Trap

more than 75 percent of college-educated workers believe that passion is an important factor in career decision making. And 67 percent of them say they would prioritize meaningful work over job stability, high wages, and work-life balance. Believers in this idea trust that passion will inoculate them against the drudgery of working long hours on tasks that they have little personal connection to. For many, following their passion is not only a path to a good job; it is the key to a good life.

frankly, the white-collar labor force was not designed to help workers nurture self-realization projects. It was designed to advance the interests of an organization’s stockholders. When people place paid employment at the center of their meaning-making journey, they hand over control of an essential part of their sense of self to profit-seeking employers and the ebbs and flows of the global economy.

Recommending that career aspirants do what they love and figure out the “employment stuff” later (…) ignores the structural obstacles to economic success that many face, and blames career aspirants if they cannot overcome obstacles. It guides workers to avoid the grind of paid work by transforming it into a space of fulfillment. But it does nothing to address the factors that make paid work feel like drudgery in the first place. Many companies also tend to exploit workers’ passion. My research finds that employers prefer workers who find their jobs fulfilling, precisely because passionate employees often provide additional uncompensated labor.

In order to circumvent the existential problems of passion, individuals can shift their personal philosophies about work. One solution is to trim paid work to fit into a more confined space in our lives: Work that can be contained in predictable hours, that provides freedom to engage in meaningful outside activities, and that allows ample time for friends, family, and hobbies may be a more desirable and self-preserving goal.

The more pertinent question, then, isn’t “How can I change my career path to do work that I love?” but rather “How can I wrangle my work to leave me with more time and energy for the things and people that bring me joy?” 

No one should entrust the bulk of their sense of self to a single social intuition, especially one within something as tempestuous as the labor market.