What is the Myth of the Work Ethic

Many people think wrong about the work ethic. They believe that a person's fate is largely determined by this factor. Indeed, he becomes one of the important aspects in one's work, but it is not the only cause that greatly determines the level of one's welfare.

The work ethic is too often blamed as the cause of a poor or not optimal work result. In some cases, this assumption may be justified, but it is not always the case. The results of poor work, not of quality, and not optimal, can be caused by intentional purposes to obtain certain benefits.

Work Ethics and Bureaucratic Services

It's no secret that many citizens have recently complained about the work ethic of bureaucrats in providing public services. These complaints are related to slow and long-winded services, complicated bureaucratic procedures, to unofficial levies that often occur.

The shortcut is that paying a certain amount of money is the only way for the community to get fast service and without going through complicated procedures. Some sociologists reject the reasons for the work ethic of the bureaucracy as an obstacle in providing good service to the community.

Why is that? The problem lies more in the temporary mindset of bureaucrats who make positions as extensions of the means of production. As a means of production, positions must make money. To make money, any public service must be convoluted and lengthy.

If you want to get out of the problem and get privileges, a shortcut is provided. But it's not free, people have to pay some money. The money will not go into the State treasury but will go into the personal pocket of the bureaucrat in question.

In the concept of public accountability and transparency, the quality of public services is an indicator or measure of the occurrence of corruption in the bureaucracy.

The better the quality of public services provided, the smaller the occurrence of corruption in the bureaucracy. Vice versa, the worse the quality of public services, the greater the occurrence of corruption in the bureaucracy.

So, the poor quality of public services is not just a matter of work ethic. But even worse is the bad mindset that is the perspective of bureaucrats in providing public services.

Simplifying this problem as a weak work ethic is tantamount to simplifying the problem to become personal. Yet this issue is not a question of personal capacity, but an institutionalized fraudulent act.

This includes the problem of institutionalized fraud, the solution is not training on procedures for providing good public services or education that is intended to increase the capacity of each bureaucrat.

They already know and are aware of the problem, in fact, they also have the ability. But the problem is that they don't want to do it. They do not want to provide fast or good quality public services, because that will reduce their income.

Work Ethic and Welfare

Many agree that a person's poverty is caused by people who are lazy to work and have a low work ethic. This assumption may be true, but it may not always be true. Let's see the farmer, from sunrise to sunset, works hard, but is still poor.

The same applies to workers, who work for at least eight hours every day, but are still not rich. Likewise with housemaids, who practically work almost 24 hours a day, also do not become prosperous. So, should we still call them lazy with a low work ethic?

The problem of poverty is structural, not just a cultural or personal problem. Poverty occurs because there is a system that does not favor the weak but supports the strong.

Farmers are made to bend their knees to the will of traders when they are going to sell their crops. He had to accept the price offered by the merchant, rather than let his crops rot. Whereas farmers have many risks that must be borne during production, ranging from pests to erratic weather.

In addition, farmers also have to buy seeds, fertilizers, and agricultural medicines, the prices of which have been determined by the traders.

After months of toil, farmers sometimes lose money because of crop failure or falling prices. In the case of crop failure due to climate, it could have been avoided if there was intervention from concerned parties, either in the form of knowledge or weather engineering.

Without a system capable of securing their position, gradually the farmers will fall deeper and deeper into poverty. The problem regarding the selling price of crop production that falls can be caused by subjective and objective factors.

The objective factor will be following the situation related to the theory of supply and demand. Meanwhile, subjective factors could be because at that time the farmers did not have money and needed money immediately or it could be because they were trapped in the bondage system.

What about the fate of the workers? Tie three money with the farmer. The prevailing economic principle is to try with little sacrifice to get the maximum profit. This principle by itself has introduced the concept of efficiency in the production process. Labor wages are included in this component.

Labor wages, raw material prices, and investment costs are production components that must achieve efficiency. The lower the production costs, the more efficient the production costs will be. The more efficient the production costs, the greater the profit potential.

To achieve this efficiency, all production costs must be reduced, including labor costs. This wage policy, sometimes so inhumane. In general, a worker is paid a wage that can only be used to survive on this day.

They should be able to survive sufficiently today so that tomorrow they can still be employed again. Just like a packhorse, which is fed to be strong enough to pull a cart. But the laborer is a human, whose needs are not the same as that of a horse. Sometimes workers are paid a salary below the standard of the Decent Living Needs (KHL).

Of course, the sub-standard wages will make the workers' lives even more unworthy. The question is, why are workers willing to accept low wages for such relatively hard work? They are forced to accept that because they have no other choice to keep their life alive.

It is the social system that applies in the community that has contributed greatly to the sustainability of this kind of poverty. This community system does not side with the weak so that when farmers are entangled in financial problems they are forced to sell their crops at low prices.

The same is true of workers, who are forced to sell their labor at low prices to survive. Structurally, they are people who are excluded because they have few choices in life.

Work Ethic and Power Structure

Power structure determines a person to achieve a higher level of welfare, not work ethic. In a tight situation, people who have a high work ethic are forced to be willing to carry out a job with inadequate rewards, to fulfill their needs.

Meanwhile, the power structure holders who find people like this can easily hoard wealth without the need to work hard. The holders of this power structure then refer to themselves as smart workers, not hard workers.

Those who because of the power they have, can regulate how much compensation should be received by the people who work for them.

They will cynically suggest to "take it or leave it", to someone who objected to accepting the job because of the unsatisfactory payoff. If this person had another choice, of course, he would accept it. But if he had no other choice and this was the only opportunity for him, he had to accept it too.

The development of the times, which was also followed by an increase in population, resulted in increasingly fierce competition for jobs. The situation will increase the number of poor people who have no choice. This means that the structure of society will always lead to the strengthening of the already strong community groups and the weakening of the already weak community groups.

Perhaps the saying is true that those who work the hardest are the poorest. It has nothing to do with work ethic.