--- John Medaille <[log in to unmask]> wrote:  
  
>  Mill (following Hume) takes it as axiomatic   
> that man is averse to work.  
  
This is not a proper axiom, as we can observe many  
people enjoying pyschic income, and labor has value  
apart from the wage as providing the satisfaction of  
doing something useful and well done, and providing  
dignity, i.e. not being a charity case.  
  
So while work-aversion may be a useful premise for  
theory conditional on it, whether as a general  
proposition most who labor are averse to work is an  
empirical question specific to time and place.  
  
> when a man gets home from work,   
> he starts working on his hobby.  
  
"Labor" as a factor of production implies human action  
in the production of wealth with a market value.   
One's hobby, which provides no services of value to  
others, is leisure, not labor.  
  
> So, has Mill located a real economic axiom?   
  
No.  It is an empirical observation that only applies  
in those times and places where it is observed.  
  
The more universal axiom is that of Carl Menger  
(Principles of Economics, 1871), that values are  
subjective.  The utility of labor to the worker, apart  
from the wage, is thus subjective and cannot be  
generalized as objectively positive or negative.  
For example, regarding toil, some workers like a  
challenge and others don't.  
  
Fred Foldvary