There is a specter haunting modern life: the cult of busyness. Social schedules are stuffed to the brim; work has become the source of our identities; a smartphone ensures that we are only one alert away from taking ourselves out of the moment. And yet, hellish as this existence can be, is it possible that we enjoy bragging about our state of overwork? 

In 2017, The Atlantic declared that “Ugh, I’m so busy” had become “the status symbol of our time.”¹ It pointed to a recent study by US-based academics Silvia Bellezza, Neeru Paharia and Anat Keinan, who found that busy people are perceived as being “higher status”—a woman wearing a Bluetooth headset to conduct calls was seen as more important than one who wore headphones for music. This marks a huge reversal in how statu...