The Death of the Dream Job (newrepublic.com)

good article, most dream jobs also involve work that is not very pleasant.

IMO when people say "dream job", what most people really want is something that isn't minimum wage service work, hard-on-the-body blue-collar work, or "bullshit jobs"-style corporate work. It's pretty difficult to find work that isn't one of those three categories, especially one that doesn't require a bunch of credentials. I think the closest the average person can get to something like a "dream job" is some sort of compromise: teacher instead of service-work for people that like people, a lighter trade like carpentry instead of a heavy trade like HVAC, working at a corporation that does something you like instead of a bank, or the modern favorite: the side-hustle.

Maybe I'm just a jaded pessimist, though.