"a moral obligation to work, the conviction that a person's election by God was authenticated by his or her activism, and a pervasive ethos of living thriftily off the proceeds from such work, with the remainder being saved, invested, or simply given away."

Setting aside the religious aspects of this argument, it is, surely, an intrinsically sound position to take - one which neoliberalism opposes.

Remember that nothing of use to humankind exists without the input of human labor. All economic/social/political theories are essentially about the distribution of surpluses once an individual's basic needs have been met via his labor.

Saving ensures that something is set aside for the day when 'sh*t happens' - the harvest fails, wild fires consume it, floods destroy it, etc.

Investment improves productivity, thereby increasing the size of the surplus to be distributed.

'Giving it away', in a considered, rather than random, way, enables those who lack the ability to provide for their own basic needs to survive. It also enables those with ideas with potential for increasing productivity to develop those ideas.

In Hayek's philosophy all surpluses should remain with those who create them to dispose of as they wish. This has the potential, as Glen states at the end of his excelent piece, for Nazism in which those who cannot provide for themselves are regarded, not merely as disposable, but as an intollerable burden on society.

It also means that labor, and those who perform it, intead of being valued for it's essential worth, is seen as something that can be bought or, worse, stolen, and worse still, used as punishment.