Workplace Obligations

Paper Summary:

This paper applies the thought of philosophers John Locke, Benjamin Franklin, and Jonathan Winthrop to answer the question: What obligation does the employer have to the life quality of the employee, if the employee expects an education in return for accepting a lower wage? The author points out that Locke describes workplace relationships with the same rhetoric of freedom in which he speaks of governance by stating that all men and women should be able to market the fruits of their own labors. The paper concludes, based on these philosophers, that employees only owe the employer their working life; they must take responsibility and ownership of their own economic and personal health, ultimate education, and economic future.

From the Paper:

"The democratic British philosopher John Locke, in his 1680 essay on "Two Treatises of Government" writes that to deny that legitimate enforcement powers of government upon the populace come from the analogical parental power of a father over his children. In other words, all human beings should be free to choose their livelihoods and courses of their lives, for better or for ill. From an American perspective of today and of the Revolutionary War era during which Benjamin Franklin wrote his "Autobiography, Locke's condemnation of tyranny was a welcome philosophy from the point of view of governance of the state. Locke denied the paternalistic power of the king keep the economic fates of all in lower, proper stations."

More papers on Workplace Obligations:

• Essay # 56086 : "Women in the Workplace"
• Essay # 60883 : "Workplace Violence"
• Research Paper # 68130 : "Discrimination in the Workplace"

APA Citation:

MLA Citation: