The Protestant work ethic and attitudes towards unemployment

The literature on personal correlates of Protestant work ethic beliefs and the relationship between these beliefs and various aspects of paid work is briefly reviewed. A study is described which examines the relationship between Protestant work ethic beliefs and attitudes to unemployment. Subjects rated the importance of various explanations for unemployment in Britain, as well as their agreement with statements about social security (welfare) payments to the unemployed. As predicted, people who strongly endorsed the Protestant work ethic stressed negative individualistic explanations for unemployment and were, by and large, more against welfare payments than those who did not strongly endorse those beliefs. The results are discussed in terms of the psychology of lay economic explanations, and some implications for social change are noted.