Contemporary jobseekers conceal unemployment behind performative activity unlike their 1980s counterparts

Evidence

The endless unpaid duties assigned to the virtuoso jobseeker cast him as the postmodernised inversion of the 1980s “gizza job” persona, which confronted the employer directly with the physical reality of the reserve laborer and his family. Now, rather than proclaiming his jobless status the career jobseeker hides it, like something obscene, behind a screen of training courses and voluntary work and expressions of rictus positivity, and he becomes ever more complicit with this concealment in proportion to his desperation. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 637

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the book’s running theme of capital unifying life as always-on productivity; also pairs with older figure of the feckless unemployed worker vs today’s rictus-positive jobseeker. — connects to: Lean platform workers are highly educated yet forced by unemployment into gig work — Nick Srnicek, Platform Capitalism, 71; Urban space residents’ behaviors vary by employment status and group approval

Broader Connections

• Lean platform workers are highly educated yet forced by unemployment into gig work #complicates (0.72) — Nick Srnicek, Platform Capitalism, 71
• Urban space residents’ behaviors vary by employment status and group approval #expands (0.72)