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Lever Time

Are We Trapped In Meaningless Jobs? (With Rutger Bregman)

Lever Time

The Lever

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.8560 Ratings

🗓️ 18 December 2025

⏱️ 49 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Are we wasting our talents on meaningless jobs? Should our career choices reflect our morals? Author and historian Rutger Bregman thinks so. He argues that the most talented people in America are stuck in a real-life version of the movie Office Space  — and that we should be trying to solve the world’s biggest problems instead.  Today on Lever Time, David Sirota sits down with Bregman to ask: When did we lose our moral ambition? Are we greedy, cynical, or are we just trying to escape an ever-increasing affordability crisis?   Click here to learn about Bregman’s book, Moral Ambition: Stop Wasting Your Talent And Start Making A Difference. For a transcript of this episode, click here. Get ad-free episodes, bonus content and extended interviews by becoming a member at levernews.com/join. To leave a tip for The Lever, click here. It helps us do this kind of independent journalism. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

You're listening to the free ad-supported version of our podcast. For an ad-free experience,

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visit levernews.com slash upgrade. When Donald Trump was inaugurated like all presidents, he swore

0:12.1

an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. Instead, Donald Trump has decided

0:16.9

to swerve, deflect, and append the Constitution and treat it like a terms and conditions

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page. I'm Professor Corey Brett Schneider. And I'm deeply unqualified comedian John Fugleson.

0:27.3

We'd like to invite you to listen to the Oath in the Office podcast where every week we interpret

0:32.1

the Constitution and hold Trump accountable to his oath. It's a podcast that offers real insight on how to take action against tyranny and mayhem,

0:41.2

because despair is not a strategy.

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We'll hold him to his pledge, despite his threats to democracy and the law itself.

0:49.3

It's a podcast that's all about hope for what a real democracy should look like from an esteemed, respected

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constitutional scholar and a deeply neurotic comedian who thought the emoluments clause was a breakfast item.

1:01.1

Subscribe to The Oath in the Office where every week we talk about how citizens can preserve our democracy

1:06.7

and fight back against the threat to democracy.

1:10.1

Subscribe to The Oath in the Office on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast.

1:17.8

The Lever

1:18.7

From The Lever's reader-supported newsroom, this is Lever Time.

1:25.0

I'm David Sorota.

1:26.4

Of all the things wasted in our throwaway times, the

1:29.7

greatest is wasted talent. There are millions of people around the world who could help make the

1:34.9

world a better place, but don't. These are the words of Dutch historian Rutger Bregman, who

1:40.9

insists that too many of us are wasting our lives in dead-end, self-centered

1:45.7

jobs, and that more of us need to choose a different path, a path towards what he calls

...

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