Abstract
If you subordinated yourself for your entire working life in service to a higher purpose that turned out not to be what you hoped, was your work a waste? This article endeavors to answer that particular question-which presents itself to the protagonist of Kazuo Ishiguro's great novel, The Remains of the Day-while developing a more general account of what makes work worthy. It situates worthy work in the context of several other perspectives on work that influence employment practice and policy, including unemployment, decency, dignity, future, and meaning of work. In doing so, it attempts to move the work conversation from a narrow focus on job creation toward a broader focus on meaning creation-and to move the meaningful work conversation from a subjective exhortation to "do what you love" toward an objectively grounded ideal of what might make work worth loving.