Why America Worships Work (And Why Other Countries Don't)

In Thailand, they asked me why Americans are so obsessed with being busy. I didn't have a good answer.

I was sitting at a street-side café in Bangkok, talking with locals who'd noticed I was always on my laptop. They asked what I was working on. I explained. Then they asked the question that stopped me cold:

"But why do you work so much? Don't you want to enjoy life?"

I opened my mouth to respond—something about ambition, goals, building something meaningful—and realized I didn't have an answer that made sense. Not to them. Not even to myself anymore.

Because they were right. Americans are obsessed with being busy. We wear exhaustion like a badge of honor. We compete over who's more overworked. We shame people for resting.

And somehow, we convinced ourselves this is normal. That this is what success looks like. That this is how life should be lived.

But travel shows you something different: most of the world doesn't live this way. And they're not worse off for it. In many ways, they're better.

Work Culture as Religion: The Puritan Roots

To understand American work culture, you have to go back to the beginning. The Puritans.

Puritan theology held that hard work was a form of worship. Idleness was sinful. Leisure was suspect. Your productivity determined your moral worth. If you prospered, it was a sign of God's favor. If you struggled, it was evidence of moral failing.

That ideology never left. It just got secularized.

We don't talk about God's favor anymore. We talk about "grinding" and "hustling" and "making it." But the underlying belief is the same: your value as a human being is determined by how much you produce.

If you're not constantly working, improving, and achieving... you're lazy. Worthless. A drain on society.

This is religion. It's just dressed in productivity language instead of theological language.

And like all religions, it demands sacrifice. Your time. Your health. Your relationships. Your happiness. All on the altar of productivity.

Other countries didn't inherit this particular pathology. They have work. They value contribution. But they don't worship it. They don't tie human worth to productivity. They don't shame rest.

Europe: Work to Live vs. Live to Work

In much of Europe, work is something you do to fund your life. Not your life itself.

They have strong labor protections. Mandated vacation time—often 4-6 weeks per year. Universal healthcare not tied to employment. Shorter work weeks. Stronger boundaries between work and personal time.

When Europeans finish their work day, they finish. They're not checking emails at dinner. They're not working weekends. They're not on Slack at 10 PM "just to stay on top of things."

They're living.

They take August off. They have long lunches. They spend time with family and friends. They prioritize rest, leisure, and pleasure—not as rewards for productivity, but as inherent parts of a good life.

And here's the kicker: their economies function fine. Often better than ours in terms of quality of life, health outcomes, and happiness.

But in America, suggesting we adopt European work practices gets you labeled as lazy, entitled, or unrealistic. Because we've been conditioned to believe that suffering is the price of success. That if you're not grinding, you're not serious.

Meanwhile, Europeans look at our work culture with pity. They see us sacrificing our lives for corporations that would replace us in a week. They see us too exhausted to enjoy the money we're earning. They see us dying early from stress-related illnesses.

And they ask: Why?

Asia: Collectivism vs. American Individualism

Asia's relationship with work is more complex. There's definitely overwork—Japan's "karoshi" (death from overwork) and South Korea's intense work culture are real.

But there's also a fundamentally different framework: collectivism.

In many Asian cultures, work isn't just about individual success. It's about contributing to the family, the community, the collective. There's pressure, yes. But there's also meaning rooted in something beyond personal achievement.

And outside the major economic centers—in places like Thailand, Vietnam, Laos—I saw something else entirely. A pace of life that felt human. People worked. But they also rested. They gathered. They enjoyed food, conversation, community.

In Thailand, I watched people close their shops in the middle of the day to eat with friends. I saw street vendors laugh and chat between customers instead of obsessing over maximizing transactions. I met people who worked enough to meet their needs and then... stopped. Because why would you work more than necessary?

That question haunts me. Because in America, the answer is always: to get ahead. To save more. To achieve more. To prove yourself.

But to whom? And for what?

The Thai people I met didn't seem to need proof of their worth. They existed. That was enough. Work was a part of life, not the purpose of it.

How Work Culture Reflects What a Society Actually Values

Here's the uncomfortable truth: work culture reveals a society's real values. Not the ones we claim, but the ones we live.

American culture claims to value freedom, family, and happiness. But our work culture reveals what we actually value: productivity, wealth accumulation, and individual achievement at any cost.

We say family matters, then structure work in a way that makes parenting nearly impossible without sacrifice. We say health matters, then glorify burnout. We say happiness matters, then shame people for choosing it over career advancement.

Our work culture is the truth beneath the propaganda.

European work culture reflects different values: community, quality of life, sustainability. The belief that humans deserve rest and dignity regardless of their economic output.

Asian collectivist cultures reflect yet another set: duty, family honor, interdependence. Work serves the group, not just the individual.

None of these systems are perfect. But America's particular brand of work worship is uniquely destructive because it pretends to be about freedom while functioning as bondage.

You're "free" to work yourself to death. Free to have no healthcare if you can't afford it. Free to compete with everyone around you for scraps.

That's not freedom. That's social Darwinism with a motivational poster.

The Lie That Working Harder = Better Person

The most insidious part of American work culture is the moral dimension. We don't just believe hard work leads to success. We believe hard work makes you a good person.

Lazy people are bad people. Unmotivated people are defective. People who don't want to "hustle" lack character.

This belief is everywhere. In how we talk about poverty (they just need to work harder). In how we judge success (they earned it through hard work). In how we shame rest (must be nice to have time off).

But it's a lie. A useful lie for capitalism, but a lie nonetheless.

Working 80 hours a week doesn't make you morally superior to someone working 40. Building a billion-dollar company doesn't make you a better human than someone who teaches kindergarten. Grinding yourself into burnout doesn't prove your worth.

Your value as a person has nothing to do with your productivity. But American work culture can't admit that. Because if your worth isn't tied to your work, the entire system of exploitation falls apart.

If people realized they matter simply because they exist, they might stop sacrificing themselves for corporations that don't care about them. They might demand better. They might rest without guilt. They might prioritize joy over achievement.

And capitalism can't function if people do that.

So we're fed the lie from birth: you are what you produce. Work hard and you'll be rewarded. Rest is earned, not inherent. Your value must be proven daily through productivity.

Other cultures know better. They know humans have inherent worth. They know rest is necessary, not indulgent. They know work is a means, not an end.

But we've turned work into a religion. And like all fundamentalist religions, it punishes heretics.

What I Learned From Watching Others Live Differently

Traveling didn't just show me different work cultures. It showed me different ways of being human.

In Thailand, I learned that slowing down isn't laziness—it's presence. That enjoying a meal with friends for two hours isn't wasting time—it's living.

In Europe, I saw that strong social safety nets don't make people lazy—they make them free. Free to take risks, pursue creativity, change careers, prioritize family.

In smaller communities across Asia, I witnessed people who didn't chase endless growth. They worked enough. They had enough. And they spent the rest of their time being alive.

Meanwhile, Americans are the wealthiest, most productive people in human history. And we're miserable. Stressed. Isolated. Burnt out.

We have more stuff and less joy. More achievement and less meaning. More productivity and less life.

Because we worship work. And work is a jealous god that demands everything and gives back nothing but exhaustion.

The Permission You Don't Need (But I'll Give Anyway)

You don't have to live this way.

You don't have to grind. You don't have to hustle. You don't have to prove your worth through productivity.

You don't have to answer emails after 6 PM. You don't have to work weekends. You don't have to sacrifice your health, your relationships, your joy for a company that will replace you the moment it's convenient.

You don't have to be busy to be valuable. You don't have to be exhausted to be important. You don't have to be overworked to be worthy.

You're allowed to rest. You're allowed to say no. You're allowed to prioritize your life over your job.

You're allowed to work to live, instead of living to work.

I know it's scary. I know the conditioning runs deep. I know the system punishes people who opt out.

But I also know this: the people I met who rejected the American work religion weren't miserable. They were present. They were connected. They were alive in ways I'd forgotten were possible.

And that's not because they're lazy or lack ambition. It's because they remember something Americans have forgotten:

Work is what you do. It's not who you are.

The Question That Changed Everything

So I'll leave you with the question that Thai street vendors asked me. The one I couldn't answer at first but think about every day now:

"Why do you work so much? Don't you want to enjoy life?"

What's your answer?

And more importantly: if you don't have a good answer, why are you still living that way?