Explaining Low Pay for the Valuable

In a blindingly obvious piece of market research Reuters reports that most people are not in their dream jobs.

More than four out of five U.S. workers do not have their dream jobs, which most people describe as work that is fun, according to a survey released on Thursday.

Salary was one of the least important requirements of a dream job, cited by just 12 percent of respondents in the survey by CareerBuilder.com, an online job site, and The Walt Disney Co, which is holding a contest in which winners can get a chance to work at a Disney theme park job for a day.

Having fun at a dream job was cited by 39 percent, with 17 percent saying making a difference in society was most important, the survey showed.

OK, so many would like a dream job, cash isn't the determinant of a dream job, so which jobs have the highest numbers of people in them that think they are dream jobs? 

Among professions, police and firefighters were most likely to say they have their dream jobs, at 35 percent, followed by 32 percent of teachers, 28 percent of real estate professionals and 25 percent of engineers.  

Also

Fields with the least number of workers with dream jobs were accommodations and food services at 9 percent, manufacturing at 9 percent and retail at 10 percent.

The dream jobs are more dangerous, often require a great deal more training and so on but do not, necessarily, pay vastly better than the ones people don't like.

Because, of course, they are dream jobs: if people like what they're doing so much there is less need to bribe them with cash to do the job.