More Great British Public

An intriguing survey reported to me today by YouGov. On the basis of a quick look at the sample, details of which are presumably available on their website, it all looks fair enough.

The relevant question was: 'generally speaking, please say whether you would or would not like to do each of the following for a living'.

Respondents were asked this question in respect of a list of eight jobs, with each respondent's list being very nearly a random quarter of the list as a whole. The result of which was that for each job the question was asked of some 3,500 people. But I didn't get as far as working out how many of the jobs listed the average respondent would go for.

One can only suppose that while people might go weak at the knees at the idea of being an author or librarian, they are nevertheless sensible enough about getting to their next shift at the burger bar. The BH thought was that there were plenty of people out there doing either unpleasant or boring menial work, to whom the idea of being a librarian, all warm, clean and cosy, would seem both attractive and not so unrealistic as to be uninteresting. For example, care workers.

The exercise points up the difficulty of getting information about this sort of thing on the basis of a simple yes-no question, with this particular question not telling us all that much about how many people would apply for a librarian's job, how many people are qualified for such a job or how many school children (excluded from this sample) would so aspire.