The Meaning and Value of Work Chapter Five

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The Meaning and Value of WorkChapter Five

• Jerry Estenson

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Some question to start our thinking about work

• Is work simply a means to an end?
• Is work itself possibly an end rather than a
  means?
• What responsibilities does an employer have in
  this discussion?

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For what it is worth

• There is a calculus related to freedom, work and
  debt
• Low debt greater degrees of freedom

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The Protestant work ethic

• Genesis, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Benjamin
  Franklin
• Work and the acquisition of wealth focus human
  attention away from mischief toward conducting a
  worthwhile life

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The Meaning of Work

• How we think about work shapes our understanding
  of work. (Attitude counts big time)
• Work defined Perseverance, discipline, toil,
  serious, concentration. (add to the list)
• Is work only an exchange for wages?

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Different views

• Job a role one steps into
• Career a path for development
• Calling Who you are is determined fully by what
  you do. Not morally inseperable

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Value of Work
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Instrumental value of work

• Attain income
• Psychic good personal satisfaction, self-worth,
  happiness, achievement
• Social good We are social beings (Aristotle and
  need social status, honor, respect,
  companionship, and camaraderie
• Importance to community

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Douglas McGregor

• Survival
• Security
• Acceptance by others
• Association with others
• Friendship
• Self-Esteem
• Status
• Respect
• Outlet for creativity
• Self-development

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Do people have a moral and legal right to a job?
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Views of Work

• Conventional - Classic
• Work does violence to the human spirit (Stud
  Terkel)
• Greeks work should be avoided so that people
  pursue a life contemplation, art, politics, and
  culture
• Humans are intellectual being but work is
  physical
• Work is glorified reducing human vitality

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Conventional - Hedonistic

• Work is the price we pay to get the things that
  make life enjoyable
• Work allows us to get what we want
• Work is a means to our individually defined ends

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Human Fulfillment

• Telos (Human Potential)
• Teleological ethics Life is to be spent
  developing and fulfilling our potential
• What is lost if we do not work
• Perseverance
• Diligence
• Concentration

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When people do not work

• Lazy
• Careless
• Apathetic
• Destruction of community
• Valliants study (willingness and capacity to
  work childhood is a strong predictor of good
  mental health as an adult)
• Big question revolves around the worker shaping
  work and work shaping worker

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Nature of work

• Karl Marx
• Alienation
• Results when work prevents the full development
  of human potential by separating worker from
  final product, from the creative process, and
  from connection with each other
• Not Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am)
  Laboro ergo sum (I work therefore I am)

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Liberal Model

• Relationship between work and the workers ability
  to make free and autonomous choices about work
• Bowie (If people are compelled to work the
  greater the employers responsibility to ensure
  that workplaces are humane as possible)
• Primary goods required in the workplace to
  provide rights related to
• Autonomy
• Rationality
• Physical and mental health

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In Sum

• Employer obligation to
• Allow for participation
• Provide due process
• Provide Healthy and safe working conditions
• Fair wages
• Fair benefits
• Training and education
• Privacy
• Highly routinized work is OK if people choose the
  work free of external constraints