It’s not all frivolous gawking of the gossip rag variety. Despite being completely devoid of commentary or argument (the interview transcripts are presented verbatim and there is no authorial voice to be heard),

Hard at Work

attempts to highlight the unequal circumstances each person in Singapore has to toil in every day. (That the book’s foreword is written by Teo You Yenn and the word ‘inequality’ is repeated in its blurbs lend some credence to my interpretation.)

For one, the bulk of the interviews are derived from people in industries like “selling”, “making and repairing”, and “recycling and cleaning”; in other words, industries that typically comprise low-wage and low-skill workers. We read about the elderly karang guni man who earns “at most $200” in an entire month; the electronics worker who “work close to 10 years already, pay … only $1000 plus”; the student care teacher whose “salary is only $1.5K” despite being in a more ‘respectable’ profession. This is juxtaposed against the accounts of the doctor, still in his 20s, who earns $5000 to $6000 a month, or the $6000 in commission the real estate agent made when he closed his very first sale at 22.