New Books in Economics

Erik Baker, "Make Your Own Job: How the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic Exhausted America" (Harvard UP, 2025)

Mar 2, 2025

Erik Baker, author of "Make Your Own Job," explores the evolution of the American work ethic and how entrepreneurialism transformed it over the twentieth century. He discusses the shift from traditional job security to today's gig economy, linking it to historical movements like the New Thought. Baker critiques the constant push for self-actualization at work, arguing it has legitimized economic insecurity. He reveals how diverse figures, from Marcus Garvey to Henry Ford, shaped this ethos, ultimately reflecting societal anxieties about work in an unstable economy.

58:12

Episode guests

Erik Baker

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Quick takeaways

The entrepreneurial work ethic, rooted in late 19th-century thought, has reshaped American attitudes towards employment, emphasizing self-driven initiative over traditional job security.

This cultural shift towards individualism and entrepreneurship has legitimized economic insecurity, placing the burden of job creation on workers instead of economic systems.

Deep dives

The Rise of Entrepreneurialism as a Work Ethic

Entrepreneurialism has emerged as a dominant work ethic that shapes contemporary attitudes toward employment and success. This work ethic encourages individuals to create their own job opportunities rather than adhere to traditional employment structures. It promotes the idea that success is derived from relentless self-driven effort and innovation, reflecting a broader cultural shift toward valuing individualism and personal agency. The historical context for this growth lies in changing economic landscapes and societal expectations surrounding work, with entrepreneurialism becoming intertwined with personal identity and achievement.

Intro

2min

Navigating Transition: From Academia to Entrepreneurialism

12min

The Evolution of Entrepreneurial Thinking in the New Thought Movement

5min

Evolving Management and Entrepreneurship in America

14min

The Evolution of Work Ethics and Cultural Conservatism in America

2min

Entrepreneurialism and American Capitalism

12min

The Gig Economy: A Historical Perspective Beyond Technology

4min

Navigating the Culture of Entrepreneurship in Modern Work

4min

How Americans think about work changed profoundly over the course of the twentieth century. Thrift and persistence came to seem old-fashioned. Successful workers were increasingly expected to show initiative and enthusiasm for change—not just to do their jobs reliably but to create new opportunities for themselves and for others. Our culture of work today is more demanding than ever, even though workers haven't seen commensurate rewards.

Make Your Own Job: How the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic Exhausted America (Harvard University Press, 2025) by Dr. Erik Baker explains how this entrepreneurial work ethic took hold, from its origins in late nineteenth-century success literature to the gig economy of today, sweeping in strange bedfellows: Marcus Garvey and Henry Ford, Avon ladies and New Age hippies. Business schools and consultants exhorted managers to cultivate the entrepreneurial spirit in their subordinates, while an industry of self-help authors synthesized new ideas from psychology into a vision of work as “self-realization.” Policy experts embraced the new ethic as a remedy for urban and Third World poverty. Every social group and political tendency, it seems, has had its own exemplary entrepreneurs.

Dr. Baker argues that the entrepreneurial work ethic has given meaning to work in a world where employment is ever more precarious––and in doing so, has helped legitimize a society of mounting economic insecurity and inequality. From the advent of corporate capitalism in the Gilded Age to the economic stagnation of recent decades, Americans have become accustomed to the reality that today’s job may be gone tomorrow. Where work is hard to find and older nostrums about diligent effort fall flat, the advice to “make your own job” keeps hope alive.

This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars.

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