Some jobs alienate workers by requiring them to deny the humanity of others

Evidence

Worker alienation summarizes several concerns: the extent to which the worker makes decisions about the work, has control over what is made and how it is fashioned, and influences the disposition of the product. Alienation at times also refers to the extent to which workers are able to express, or need to suppress, their creative and human impulses through work activity. Assembly lines, in which mechanical, repetitive processes are performed, are regarded as alienating for these reasons. to Jobs that require workers to deny the basic humanity of others may also be considered alienating. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 566

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the book’s earlier claims that client control and service shortfalls rest on depersonalized processing; denial-of-humanity as alienating work prefigures the chronicle of poor clients’ treatment. — connects to: Alienation describes the worker-to-work relationship from which attitudes derive, not a psychological trait — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 565; Working in advertising was argued to degrade the worker’s own humanity through constant deception — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 263; Service jobs require workers to perform and suppress feelings for pay — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 506

Broader Connections

• Working in advertising was argued to degrade the worker’s own humanity through constant deception #exemplifies (0.90) — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 263
• Service jobs require workers to perform and suppress feelings for pay #expands (0.85) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 506