> people don't talk about it socially either

Yeah totally, and I'd say that's exactly because of "status", which is mentioned:

High-status professions are the hardest ones to unpack

Status is the thing people tend to communicate socially, not what they actually do day to day

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I remember a pg line that cuts to the core of this:

It might be a good rule simply to avoid any prestigious task. If it didn't suck, they wouldn't have had to make it prestigious.

How To Do What You Love - https://paulgraham.com/love.html

It seems like a good rule to me ...

sometimes its the power that makes the prestige though.