Being a 'designer'

Something that I found sad and interesting - when you introduce yourself as an artist or a designer, people are usually like 'Oh... hmm... ok I'm gonna talk to somebody over there'. Whereas if you say you're a lawyer, people's reaction would be 'Oh wow, hmmm i should talk to you then'.

Why are artists and designers perceived as unimportant people in society? I was introducing myself to someone at a party as a graphic design student. The initial reaction I got was 'wow you're so lazy." I instantly got confused, why did he relate laziness to graphic designers, and how did he make such assumptions. I then talked to somebody else, and this time the person asked me "Oh okay.. so what exactly do you do? I mean, what kind of job do you do in the future?"

I told him that graphic designers design posters, CD covers, book covers, signage, business c

ards, logos, we help build corporate identity, we make advertisements to attract customers etc." He seemed puzzled, as though this is not a real legit job, as though this is something that doesn't need to be learnt. Why does this happen?

I came across this 'Good typography is invisible, Bad typography is everywhere' poster on the internet. I think that the general public takes good design for granted, good design is everywhere, they merge into our lives so seamlessly that nobody really notice them. Whereas with bad design, people can immediately point out and criticize it. Is this the reason why people don't 'get' graphic design because it is everywhere?