Also the term "Work" cannot strictly be ascribed to activity undertaken at others behest for monetary or social benefits, which can more accurately be called "servile work" or more brutally "slavery." Only activity taken up by self-motivation for creative or altruistic purposes can be truly defined as (Creative) "Work."
The second thing to be noticed is that the (only?) goal of human life (in civilisation) has been to reduce the work involved in any activity. This has been especially evident during the Industrial Revolution, when steam
power & later use of fossil fuels & electrical power has been to reduce human work or to put it more bluntly, drudgery. The classic example being the mass manufacture of pins quoted in Adam Smith's "The Wealth of Nations." Such being the case, elevating "hard work" to an almost divine virtue, is ridiculous.
If this has happened to a great extent in manual & even skilled labour (eg: robotics), AI (Artificial Intelligence) promises to take it even further into activity involving "human?" Intelligence. This leaves only truly "Creative" activity in human hands (minds?). This may include artistic activity & thinking up new fields like calculus, fractals, quantum theory & the like, which were so thought of in the first place.
