What Makes Work Meaningful and Why Economists Should Care about It

Milena Nikolova and Femke Cnossen ()
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Femke Cnossen: University of Groningen

No 13112, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We demonstrate why meaningful work, i.e. job-related activities that individuals view as purposeful and worthwhile, matters to labour economists. Building on self-determination theory, which specifies the roles of autonomy, competence, and relatedness as preconditions for motivation, we are the first to explore the determinants of work meaningfulness. Specifically, using three waves of the European Working Conditions Survey, we show that autonomy, competence, and relatedness explain about 60 percent of the variation in work meaningfulness perceptions. Meanwhile, extrinsic factors, such as income, benefits, and performance pay, are relatively unimportant. Meaningful work also predicts absenteeism, skills training, and retirement intentions, which highlights the concept's economic significance. We provide new insights that could help organise the future of work in a meaningful and dignifying way and propose concrete avenues for future research on meaningful work in economics.

Keywords: labour economics; non-monetary benefits of work; motivation; meaningful work; labour market outcomes; self-determination theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I30 I31 J01 J30 J32 J81 M50 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2020-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hpe and nep-lma
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (32)

Published - published in: Labour Economics, 2020, 65, 101847

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