Who funds the lifestyle of Spain’s 'cosmetic' jobs?

The debate over 'cosmetic' professions and who supports them

There is a figure that raises eyebrows: in an employment office in Dos Hermanas (Seville), records show **322 assigned civil servants but only 7 or 8 actually working**, according to calculations circulating in the discussion. This number fuels a broader thesis running through the conversation: there exists a layer of jobs—nutritionists, psychologists, trainers, coaches, diversity specialists—whose visible lifestyle on social media does not match their declared economic activity. The central question is not so much what they do, but **how they make a living**.

How they make a living: family, partner, or State

The first answer is the most obvious and least romantic: **family**. One participant sums it up in three words: "they live off family, obviously." Another adds the missing piece: **emotional subsidy**, where a partner covers hundreds of euros in rent, dinners, and trips while the Instagram profile posts staged success. The thesis completes with the third pillar: the **public sector**. Psychologists placed in HR departments, nutritionists starting to get positions in public health in some regions, social workers in NGOs or administrations. Social work, speech therapy, and psychology are argued to have better-paid career paths than their fruta suggests.

The bubble is not just female

Here the analysis splits. Against the initial diagnosis, several messages remind us that the ecosystem of **charlatans** is mixed: coaches, CrossFit instructors, physical trainers, and creatine/protein sellers are mostly male, yet no one dedicates threads to them. The criticism, it is argued, applies double standards depending on who exercises it. It is also noted that social media has multiplied the **reach** of an old phenomenon: nepotism and quick riches always existed; what is new is LinkedIn, Instagram, and TikTok as showcases for success that sometimes cannot withstand an audit.

The case that triggered comparisons: the 18-year-old appointee

Among the concrete examples shared, one illustrates the mechanism better than any statistic: an **18-year-old appointed CEO** at a friend of his father's business, with employees doing the work while he merely supervised. No business degree, no engineering, barely finished vocational training. The anecdote links to the phenomenon of the **ghost civil servant**: David Sánchez, the brother of the Spanish Prime Minister, is mentioned as the tip of the iceberg of a practice that, according to the thread's most aggressive estimates, would reach **hundreds of thousands of appointees** with paychecks but no portfolios in town halls, provincial councils, autonomous communities, and ministries.

Captive vote and the debt paying for it all

The conversation drifts toward electoral arithmetic. It lists **9,000,000 retirees, 2,470,000 Minimum Vital Income recipients, 1,500,000 non-contributory pensions, 2,500,000 chronically unemployed, 3,800,000 civil servants, and 2,000,000 ghost civil servants** to conclude that there is a captive voting bloc of more than 21 million people tied to the PP and PSOE. The economic conclusion comes from another message: all this is sustained by **debt**, printed money that future generations will pay for.

The profile completing the picture: the woman in her thirties preparing for exams

A specific testimony closes the circle. A woman with a tourism degree, two years in London to learn English, back in her village in her thirties, studying for the Civil Guard entrance exam while her networks show trips and dinners paid for by her partner, a man in his forties whom, according to this account, she will leave halfway once she passes. The anecdote connects with a more structural observation: the university degree functions as a **modern dowry**, a credential displayed before abandoning the career path to dedicate oneself to child-rearing.

How much of this diagnosis is a real bubble and how much is the latest layer of resentment against those living better? The Dos Hermanas data, if true, deserves an audit. The rest, for now, are screenshots.