Virtual Vocation: is being an internet influencer a true vocation, in the Christian sense of that term?

“the intrinsic value of work cannot be reduced to its monetary value. Farmers, factory workers, the people who pick up our garbage, and others who perform services vital to our physical existence are doing far more important tasks than celebrities…and yet they are paid far, far less.” - Veith

Discussion

The author misses how capitalism value work. He states:

Now the intrinsic value of work cannot be reduced to its monetary value. Farmers, factory workers, the people who pick up our garbage, and others who perform services vital to our physical existence are doing far more important tasks than celebrities–not just influencers, but movie stars and professional athletes–and yet they are paid far, far less.

He confuses the “work” with the “worker”. While what the factory may produce and contribute to society may be more valuable than a single influencer in terms of real output, the worker may not be. A factory worker is easier to hire and train, than an influencer may be. In addition, the influencer in and of themselves can create significantly more financial activity than a single factory work, and in some cases maybe more than a factory.

An influencer can make a product go viral and explode. This in turn can cause a factory to go into overtime and/or expand which creates jobs for workers, people and companies in the supply chain, and other venues. This creates great economic activity. While an influencer seems like a weird job, it is, at the end of the day, a marketing job. Some of them work very hard at what they do. My son dates a social media influencer who gets paid for her social media marketing, and she does work hard at it.