Socially Useless Labour

no direct citation is given for this information, but several links to related studies and documents are listed at the bottom of the wikipedia entry.  Presumably the numbers came form a recent paper written in the USA, if that helps you find the original data and methodology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productive_and_unproductive_labourSeems like marx had some non-intuitive views on productive and non-productive labor which maybe you want to consider in framing your question? maybe you're question needs to be rephrased or expanded on or revised in order to get an answer that has value to you? here's some other key quotes that caught my attention in the wikiepdia entry. . . the definition of productive and unproductive labour is specific to each specific type of society (for example, feudal society, capitalist society, socialist society etc.) and depends on the given relations of production.there exists no neutral definition of productive and unproductive labour; what is productive from the point of view of one social class may not be productive from the point of view of another. p.s. There is a theoretical way around the problem Marx stated as "no neutral definition" argument to providing an answer, but it requires a great deal of effort and you wont like it.  I could probably create a survey system that polls various people, identifies their world views and uses estimates of world view popularity to generate a separate answer for each of the social classes of concern.  then I could combine those or divide those separate answers using some more math to find out maybe more relevant questions like "what is the percent productive labor in the opinon of the bourgiuse class (worldview) or the working class (worldview) or the true socialist class of people (worldview)." (sorry, for extending the word "class" to include socialist which are class less society. maybe you can supply a better word than "class" for me that fits you're needs better. I'm offered "worldview" as an appropriate substitute word, which was not a well understood or developed concept when Marx did his writing. Here's wikipedia on "worldview" if you're interested in undertstanding how it relates to class. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_view . In my opinion, the concept of class is subordinate to the concept of worldviews. that is to say that there are more worldviews than their are classes and every class has at least one worldview assoicated with it. A "class" is regidely defined by economic logic, but a worldview is defined and scoped by a concurance of beliefs. So if you take any regidely defined class, and sample it's worldviews statistically with a survey, you could use those beleifs and answers to questions in order to state for a particular class, their estimated percentage of agreeemnt or their average estimate of the percent of non-productive activity. 

“Using these 2014 figures and calculations, the financial services sector comprises about 16.9% of the global economy, as measured in GDP. Further data from the IMFshows that the total service economy makes up about 60-65% of total global revenue. If the OECD's suggestion that financial services are between 20% and 30% of the total service market, then financial services would comprise between 12% and 19.5% of the total global economy.” 17% then?A summary of the key findings include: (1) an estimated $360 billion was spent worldwide on criminal justice in 1997; and (2) of the total, 62 percent was spent on public policing, 3 percent on prosecutions, 18 percent on courts, and 17 percent on prisons. Criminal justice expenditure levels were found to be significantly tied to levels of available public monies About 1% ???????????? Military about 3%? http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/spending.htm Retail “…..making it responsible for roughly 28.4% of total GDP. Some figures dispute that amount, claiming direct retail companies are only responsible for 9 to 10% of total GDP, while the rest is indirectly generated because of retail activity….” http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/071415/what-portion-global-economy-represented-retail-sector.asp  We could maybe say half of direct retail economy is taking money etc and make it 5%. So 26% so far?  It looks like the non financial service sector is quite large at say 60-17 = 43% But a lot of that looks ‘useful’; Examples of tertiary industries may include the following: • Entertainment • Government • Telecommunication • Hospitality industry/tourism • Mass media • Healthcare/hospitals • Public health • Information technology • Waste disposal But anyway we are down to about 75% nominally useful. I suppose individuals involved in ‘useful labour’ could come up with figures on the percentage of that which is useless. I work in manufacturing and think I would set that quite high at over 20%. I think that is conservative for where I work; we are very top heavy which is probably related to a high degree of automation etc. Not so much on site factory workers but cross multi producing site head office. workers. Actually a lot of what I do is wouldn’t be done in socialism as I check raw materials to make sure they are not deliberately shafting us rather than just goofing up.  So another 20% of 75% = 15% Raising it to 40% I also think socially useless labour has to be connected to technologically related socially unnecessary labour power. Ie making stuff in a labour intensive way where other technologies are available but not employed because of the low cost of labour power in the third world in particular. Difficult to calculate? There is inverse reserve army of the unemployed whatever that is etc. I think we could give that a 5% 45% All the fanny for the consumption fund of the ruling class but that is probably not all that great 2%? 47% And there is ancillary stuff buried no doubt in the primary data. I think working class bling and consummerist Prozac is important as well. Making crap stuff that falls apart after they get the hang of it. I have a friend who bought one of the first microwave ovens in the early 1980’s; it is still working and she uses it a lot. I think some of that 47% might be ‘done’ in socialism; I think we will still have bean counters or ‘book-keeping’ in socialism. But it maybe it is a start?

Dohgh,I feel as dumb as homer simpson right now.  Sorry, for not recognizing the difference.  My bad. Appologies for taking your time reading and thanks for your time to reply. One minor additional thought came to me after reading other better replies to your question. . . I think you should consider all marketing, and PR and competitive advantage seeking industries.  So all of advertising is socially useless in my opinion because it's purpose is clearly intended to get a bigger piece of the market share pie and not to grow the market pie.  I think if the labor were socially usefull it would maybe grow teh market share pie? I'm not sure if that's the logical test that's correct, and would deffer to your judgement on the decision.   Obviously my suggestion that advertising as an industry sector is included in the definition of "socially useless labor"  is a suggestion biased by my economic worldview so maybe my proposed inclusion is just my idea of "socially useless labor" and not relevant to YOUR definition of socially useless labor.

http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/study-ad-industry-contributed-nearly-20-percent-toward-us-gdp-2014-168164