McElroy's thesis serves to isolate America from Europe, intellectually, in its development, and affirms America's sense of being a special nation in relation to the rest of the world. The vastness of the American wilderness, and its wide-open spaces that gave rise to the need for self-reliance also helps explain why modern European social welfare state institutions, like socialized medicine and generous pension plans, often meet with resistance in an America that is still in love with the ideal of individualism and hard work. Even in today's discussion regarding the status of illegal immigrants, on both sides of the debate, the willingness of desperate people to work for a mere pittance at jobs that Americans find too hard or poorly paying is often seen as admirable, rather than tragic, because hard work is so valued in American society.
McElroy's focus on the colonial period on of American history, however, neglects to take into consideration certain important shifts in American values that have taken place since the Jamestown failure and the success of Plymouth and the later American western expansion and settlement. The influx of immigrants...
These changes in American demographics have, to some extent, tarnished the ideal that manual labor is itself a value.
Hence, the unwillingness for many American to assume backbreaking jobs in the restaurant industry and in landscaping that immigrant laborers seem willing to perform. Hence the increased demands for parents not to encourage their children to learn the value of hard work and discipline by forcing the children to mow the family lawn on Sunday or take a part-time job, but to find an unpaid internship that will improve the child's resume and chances of attending a more prestigious college than his or her father and mother. Today, hard work and manual labor are acceptable only if they are seen as improving one's financial and class status in America, and the idea of profiting from one's labor in proportion to one's efforts, although a cherished ideal, is often belied in the reality that better-paid white collar jobs in management do not demand the hours and effort of blue-collar jobs.
