Barry Schwartz argues today in the NYT that work – and by that he means our career or employment or professional aspirations and accomplishments – is not simply a matter of money but also a matter of personal fulfillment:

It is true, of course, that people work for money, and if they weren’t
getting paid, they wouldn’t work at all. But people aren’t working only
for money. They are also working because they think their work serves a
purpose, or they are devoted to excellence, or they love what they do.
When you offer people bonuses for doing their jobs, you are telling
them that money is not just one of many reasons to work, but the only
reason.

    He has a nice summary statement at the end:

The more society embraces the idea that nobody will do anything right
unless it pays, the more true it will become that nobody does anything
right unless it pays. And this is no way to run a ballclub, a school
system, or a country.

      And this, as you might have guessed, got me to thinking about how Confucianism and Taoism treat the question of work and money and personal fulfillment.

      Confucians would agree with Schwartz: we should not let money determine the worth of our work (and they would like the title of Schwartz’s book: “The Costs of Living: How Market Freedom Erodes the Best Things in Life.”)   But they would differ with Schwartz on what the purpose of work ought to be.  What is most important in life is the cultivation of our closest loving relationships.  We should not let our work interfere with that.  Nor should we let the pursuit of material benefit and profit define our daily efforts to create and extend Humanity in the world.  Confucius himself was not rich.  He did, at one point, hold down a government post, but more often he was reminding us that penury was virtuous, and that we should not worry about whether we had the job of our dreams:

The Master said: “Don’t grieve when
people fail to recognize your ability. Grieve when you fail to recognize theirs.”  (1.16)

     It is better to accept poverty than pursue wealth in a manner that undermines your Humanity (and by Humanity is meant your performance of family obligations):

The Master said: "Poor food and water for dinner, a bent arm for a pillow – that is where joy resides.  For me, wealth and renown without honor are nothing but drifting clouds. (7.16)

     Our lives should be guided by our efforts to realize "Way," which for Confucius is the harmonious concatenation of carefully enacted social obligations:

The Master said: “The noble-minded devote themselves to the
Way, not to earning a living. A farmer
may go hungry, and a scholar may stumble into a good salary. So it is that the
noble-minded worry about the Way, not poverty and hunger.” (15.32)

      So, work is what we do to secure some minimal material existence but it should never be allowed to get in the way of our social obligations.   A Confucian does not find personal fulfillment in work; he or she finds fulfillment in social duties.  If we are talented and lucky enough to secure better paying work, that is all for the good, as long as it is kept "for the good;" that is, those work duties should not transgress our family duties. 

      If someone were to pose to a Confucian the counterargument that better paying work is necessary for the fulfillment of family obligations, he would only partially agree.  Yes, more money might make it easier to support your parents and  children and friends.  But a Confucian would warn against taking this idea too far.  What is more important, from this perspective, is time and attention.  Better to live more modestly and spend more time with parents and children, than to have more to eat and better clothes but hardly see your family at all.

     Taoists have a different view, somewhat closer to Schwartz.  They would agree that money is not what is important; indeed, they might go further and say that money is essentially meaningless.  But they would see work, our physical and mental activities, as being a means of personal fulfillment of sorts.   Family duties matter less to Taoists than they do to Confucians, so that would not be as big an issue.  Rather, the possibility of using work to follow Way would intrigue a Taoist.  I am thinking here especially about the story of the butcher who, through his mastery of his craft, is able to connect to Way. The full story is a bit long (it is here, down a paragraph or two, the story of the cook), but let me just cite the money graf:

The cook put down his knife and replied: "Tao is what I care about, and Tao goes beyond mere skill.  When I first began cutting up oxen, I could see nothing but the ox.  After three years, I could see more than the ox.  And now, I meet the ox in spirit.  I’ve stopped looking with my eyes.  When perception and understanding cease, the spirit moves freely…(39-40)

     And that is when we connect to Way.      

     Work, from this point of view, is a means of discovering and following Way.  But only when we forget about our immediate concerns, or anything as base as money or pay or material benefit.  In order to realize genuine fulfillment from work, we have to relinquish our self-interests and self-consciousness.   That is, for a Taoist, why we work.