At home-economic we think of work as an activity within an analytical structure which proposes that human action is propelled by two forces. The work often associated with volunteerism percolates along, driven by the desire to help, to impact more than oneself.
This is from a lovely essay by Russ Roberts
Aristotle has a different explanation and it is quite beautiful. He says that unlike a creditor (who only cares about the recipient because he wants to be repaid), “benefactors love and are fond of those they have treated well, even though they are neither useful to them now nor likely to become so later on.” He then says something a little shocking and quite extraordinary. The bracketed phrase is Leon’s:
“The same thing also happens with craftsmen; for every craftsman loves his own work more than he might be loved by that work were it to become alive. This is especially true, perhaps, with poets, for they love exceedingly their own poems, loving them as children. This is in fact also the case with the benefactor, for the beneficiary is the work of the benefactor; thus, the benefactor is fond of him more than “the work” [that is, the beneficiary] is of its maker.”
Home Economics 