These articles pop up pretty frequently, but I stop and read them almost every time. I think it's just because I love envisioning a world where I can comfortably live off a 15 hour/week job. For a couple minutes I can live in that world in my head. Although I do enjoy my current job quite a bit (and I'm making way more money than I every thought I would be at this point in my life), I do get the feeling fairly often that my job doesn't especially need to be done. And this feeling often gives me thoughts of moving on and trying to forge ahead in a different direction with my life. I think it's almost inevitable that at some point I'm going feel unneeded and unfulfilled enough to change something.

Say what you like about nurses, garbage collectors, or mechanics, it’s obvious that were they to vanish in a puff of smoke, the results would be immediate and catastrophic. A world without teachers or dock-workers would soon be in trouble, and even one without science fiction writers or ska musicians would clearly be a lesser place. It’s not entirely clear how humanity would suffer were all private equity CEOs, lobbyists, PR researchers, actuaries, telemarketers, bailiffs or legal consultants to similarly vanish. (Many suspect it might markedly improve.) Yet apart from a handful of well-touted exceptions (doctors), the rule holds surprisingly well.

This certainly got me thinking.