Basic Trope: A character enjoys their menial, low income job.
- Straight: Alice has a miserable job at a lousy Burger Fool, but she enjoys her duty every day.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice works in a toxic sewage system and gets paid a mere dollar per week, but she's absolutely ecstactic at her job and worships her superiors like gods.
- Happiness in Slavery
- Downplayed:
- Alice's job is boring and unremarkable, but she gets by without getting crushed by the lack of excitement.
- Alice doesn't enjoy her job that much, but the pay is enough to support her hobbies when she goes home, so she doesn't see the need for higher ambitions.
- Justified:
- Alice was desperate to find a job at anything, so the sole fact that she finally has a job is enough to make her happy.
- Alice gets to hang out with her friends as she works, easing the stress of her job.
- Alice is actually great at her job and thus she manages to get by each day pretty easily.
- Alice is non-materialistic and practical with her finances, so she doesn't really need a higher paying job.
- Alice has a trustfund or pension that helps pay for her needs. She only works as an excuse to get out of the house.
- Alice has an amazing Benevolent Boss who makes the work feel meaningful.
- Alice is disabled and feels very empowered to be able do a job and financially support herself.
- Alice lives in a society that mainly expects women to Stay in the Kitchen, so this job is the best she can get, and she knows she's lucky to have it.
- Though menial, Alice's job fits perfectly with her hobbies, reducing (if not negating) the financial drain they'd otherwise be.
- Inverted: Alice works at a famous talent agency where she earns a six figure salary, but despises her job somehow.
- Subverted:
- Alice actually hates her job and wishes she could simply die everyday, but pretending to be peppy is part of her routine.
- Alice seems to enjoy her job, but she jumps at the chance to get a more conventionally desirable career.
- Double Subverted:
- However her job makes lots of children happy and this sensation helps her to warm up to it.
- Alice surprisingly hates her new job and is happy to get her old one back next week.
- Parodied: Alice is the goddess of burger flipping and loves her job at the burger joint as it allows her to showcase her burger flipping magic.
- Zig-Zagged:
- Some days Alice despises her job, other times she's perfectly content.
- Alice has multiple low-paying jobs, some of which are awful but some of which are surprisingly enjoyable.
- Averted: Alice has a decent job, at a decent place, with a decent salary and she is indifferent to it.
- Enforced:
- Alice is the protagonist of a series of commercials created by the food company she works to trick people into thinking working there is fun.
- "We can only afford this Burger Fool set, but having Alice be stuck there is gonna be so depressing." "What if she actually likes the job?"
- Lampshaded: "How can you be so happy working at that dump, Alice!? Don't you have bigger dreams and plans than flipping burgers until the day you die?"
- Invoked: Alice intentionally gets a crappy job at Burger Fool, just so she can work her way up to a better job later down the line.
- Exploited: Alice is actually working for another competing burger joint, and pretends to be a new person at the competitor's place, faking a happy personality so she can grow close and eventually steal their secrets.
- Defied: Alice doesn't fake happiness and eventually quits after getting fed up with how awful the job is.
- Discussed: "Sometimes I wonder if that cashier has to fake a smile just to get through the day, or if she actually likes her job."
- Conversed: "The job sucks but she loves it? That's a major plot hole..."
- Implied: The burger joint Alice works at is hectic and draining on an average day, yet when Alice gets home, she's not drained at all.
- Deconstructed:
- The fact that Alice is happy at her job means that she's the only one that actually takes it seriously while everyone else is either a bunch of slackers, sociopaths, crazy, etc. She's practically the only person that makes eating and working there bearable.
- Alice might enjoy her job, but the low pay actually keeps her at an painful living standard.
- Alice's coworkers are actually very annoyed by her constant positivity. It seems to rub in that they're stuck here.
- Alice is a little too happy to work in minimum wage: she has plenty of experience or applicable skills that would easily grant her a pay raise or an ascension, but she absolutely refuses to seek either. People around her are not only angry that she is wasting her talents, the inevitable confrontation is going to anger Alice.
- Reconstructed:
- Alice's example raises the standards for all the workers. The crazy sociopathic slackers all either shape up or get fired.
- Because they enjoy her positive attitude, Alice's coworkers and customers jump to help when she lets slip that she's having financial troubles.
- Alice is also extremely generous and constantly gets her coworkers cheap but thoughtful gifts. She makes the experience bearable, and the other employees pay her frequent visits after moving on to bigger things.
- Alice tries to apply for a raise, and is immediately classified as redundant by the cut-throat executives who see her capabilities as a threat to their bottom line. The lesson to be learned here is that sometimes it's best to just keep your head down and be grateful that you have a job.
- Played for Laughs: Alice is The Pollyanna to an absurd degree, facing Kafka Komedy shenanigans with a constant goofy smile.
- Played for Drama:
- Alice is hated by her boss for having the gall of actually liking to work in the same hellhole establishment that he cannot escape no matter how many asses he has kissed in both a figurative and literal way. It gets very toxic, very fast, and Alice's friends question why the hell Alice has not done anything to improve the situation, like filing a complaint or leaving to a similar job, if not a better one.
- Alice's love of working for this Burger Fool is a representation of her fear of commitment and every time someone tells her to use her damn superior smarts to get a better job, they slam down on a Berserk Button.
- Played for Horror: The reason Alice loves to work in this awful environment is because she has been brainwashed to accept her role and whatever remains of her previous self is deep within her mind, begging for a release (liberty or death, it no longer cares which) it won't get any time soon.
Welcome to Happiness in Minimum Wage, can I take your order?
