Maybe your manager is mean, but maybe customers, coworkers, or partner businesses are happy. I don't mean it's all roses, but usually someone somewhere is happy even for fairly simple tasks.

But not necessarily for, say, a starving actor. Nobody really appreciates that you delivered a one-line part as an extra in a B movie. Anyone you work with is likely to either be jealous that you got a line, or feels you owe them for the priviledge of allowing you to say the line. And the viewers don't notice or care.