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pjeby comments on Why do some kinds of work not feel like work? - Less Wrong Discussion
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Supply and demand. If you have a skill that's has worth a lot in trade, evolution doesn't want you lowering the price by doing it for free. Conversely, if something isn't worth a lot in trade, but gets you friends/allies (i.e. you get smiles and small praise), then you're motivated to do it more.
It's only paradoxical until you imagine what would happen in a small community if the motivation scale was reversed.
Yes, that makes sense. Another explanation I thought of was if you're being paid or are obligated to do something, then the work is likely for someone else's benefit, in which case you'd be better off (aside from reputation) just doing the minimum amount necessary to get paid or get the obligation discharged.
There's a classic case (sorry, cite not handy) involving a day care center that started fining parents for picking up their children late, and discovered to their chagrin that parents became more likely to show up late. The usual explanation for this is that once they were paying for the late-pickup service, they felt entitled to it, and the amount of the fine wasn't nearly as much of a deterrent as the earlier social sanction had been.
The principle seems related: we do different accounting for social and financial capital, and switching a particular task from being measured in one unit to another can totally change the motivation structure for that task.
Gneezy and Rustichini 2000