Work ethic

Work ethic is a value based on hard work and diligence. Capitalists believe in the requirement of hard work and its ability to enhance character. In the context of class conflict, Marxists view the cultural ingrainment of this value as a means to delude the working class into creating more wealth for the upper class. In the Soviet Union, work ethic was seen as an ideal to strive for.

Capitalist view

Steven Malanga refers to "what was once understood as the work ethic—not just hard work but also a set of accompanying virtues, whose crucial role in the development and sustaining of free markets too few now recall.

Max Weber quotes the ethical writings of Benjamin Franklin:

Weber notes that this is not a philosophy of mere greed, but a statement laden with moral language. It is in effect an ethical response to the natural desire for hedonic reward, a statement of the value of delayed gratification to achieve self-actualization. Indeed, Franklin claims that God revealed to him the usefulness of virtue. This is questionable however because Benjamin Franklin was a Deist, who tended not to believe in God's intervention into the world. See Pennsylvania Heritage Magazine Volume XXXVII, Number 4 - Fall 2011.