American Work Values: Their Origin and Development

Paul Bernstein carefully examines the extremely slow and painful shifts in American work values taken from their European orgins to the present.Generally speaking, the book describes how the individual has subscribed to the work ethic through the centuries under various types of conditions based on birth, education, skill, tenacity and pure luck.The book also deals with "the debates related to work and welfare that has always been a controversy over public assistance to the deserving and undeserving poor."One great theme that is illustrated quite well throughout the book is the persistent challenge for the individual, especially one taught to believe that hard work will be rewarded with opportunities, to delicately balance between work, pleasure, personal, and leisure activities. I keep asking myself (for the first time in my life) why can't people work smarter, not harder in America? Unfortunately, this issue must be resolved by reading other books since the author did not faithfully address this important topic.This book has an incredible number of footnotes backed up with an exorbitant amount of pages pointing to other references. I found the book to be extremely difficult to read. I had to review chapters over and over again, to figure out what the author was trying to explain. Some very important parts were simply "glossed over." There are sections throughout the book that require proofreading for the next edition because it is repetitive and not carefully organized.Credit must be given to the author for the extremely valuable gems that I did synthesize from the book. It was worth it. However, please condense it into fifty pages. This is a wonderful book!