I’ve worked manual labor jobs in old house restoration, and on a farm. I’ve ripped rat feces-infested insulation out of attics and crawlspaces in the summer heat, while wearing a full tyvek suit and mask. I’ve also had jobs in cubicles and open offices where I spent 90% of the day pretending to work.

I hear a lot of people in manual labor jobs saying that it must be nice to sit at a desk and pretend to work all day, often insisting that they would love the free time to take a class online or read a book, but it doesn’t work that way. Your computer screen is exposed and there are eyes on you at all times. The second you stop pretending to look busy and actually try and do something productive, a manager will appear from nowhere to chew you out or write you up. If you ask for more work, you will either be told to manage your time more wisely and punished for being efficient, or assigned the work of multiple people with unreasonable deadlines and punished if you don’t do the impossible. If I knew this 6 years ago, I might have just stayed in the trades rather than going back to school.