The Purpose of Work

What is the real purpose of work? I used to think it was (a) an exchange of your effort for cash or (b) something to keep the majority of the population entertained during the daylight hours for at least five days each week. Now that I have been unemployed for more than a year, I am starting to question exactly that - what is the purpose of work?

I still believe in the exchange of monetary gain for one's effort - but some work is completed without the exchange. Consider the "work" involved in planting and maintaining a garden. There is a lot of human effort required to bring in a suitable harvest for the table (perhaps that is part of the result - not monetary, but certainly life sustaining).

To sustain life is an interesting angle to the work question. Before the days of commerce, work was exactly that. Human effort required to sustain life - and included hunting, gathering, making of outer wear suitable to the environmental conditions, and (eventually) the making of tools to enhance the hunter/gatherer activities.

Work as defined by physics (mechanical) is "the amount of energy transferred by a force," while in thermodynamics work is "the quantity of energy transferred from one system to another." Both of these require energy to be transferred. In the book, "Your Money or Your Life," the authors have equated work to one's "life energy," which is given in exchange for some other item (generally money, but in the event of voluntary efforts, in the overall satisfaction of assisting others).

Make no mistake, gaining monetary compensation can be important (and certainly is when one is unemployed), but work in general needs to be evaluated in terms of human satisfaction. If you are not deriving some satisfaction by the expenditure of your effort (i.e., energy), then what is the purpose?

So finding employment has become more difficult. If we all have a limited number of hours/minutes/years available, and at this point I have expended more than 2/3rds of my allotment, then how should I expend the remaining energy? Monetary rewards may not be the full picture. I certainly enjoy eating and a libation from time to time fits in, but what will hold my interest.

Maslow, in his hierarchy of needs, discusses the motivation for work (see his 1943 paper, "A Theory of Human Motivation"). He postulates that there are five levels of needs, the first four are considered "deficiency" needs while the fifth and highest level is considered "self-actualization." The lower four levels, he believed, must be met before the highest level can be considered. Thus, one must conquer physiological, safety, love/belonging, and esteem before you can move to self-actualization.

The problem I see is we (at least in America) have moved all of our needs to be achieved in the attainment of "work." This leads us to becoming very dissatisfied with an employer and moving to another to find (a) a sense of "belonging" or even more important (b) to find the self-actualization need being met.

At this time my physiological need is met (food, shelter, and the like), safety (have new health insurance and neighbors who look out for me), belonging (friends, family, and the expanded community of former coworkers and church members), and esteem (no one has ever mentioned that I haven't had more than my share of successes thus far in life), which not brings me to the highest need - self-actualization. That said - what is the purpose of work?

"Work is the curse of the drinking classes." - Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)