The Burnout Economy

The Burnout Economy explains why exhaustion has become the default condition of modern life. With a clear, journalistic eye, Nathaniel Crowe traces how work, technology, and social expectations combine to keep people in a constant state of strain. Burnout is not presented as a personal failure or a simple need for more rest, but as the result of an environment that demands endless responsiveness, fragmented attention, and nonstop self-management. From the hidden labor of home life to the attention traps of digital platforms and the erasure of the workday's boundaries, this book shows how ordinary routines can become draining in ways that are easy to overlook and hard to escape. Readers will come away with a sharper understanding of the forces shaping their fatigue, along with practical insight into how to reclaim energy, attention, and control in a system built to take more than it gives.