Protestant Work Ethic Endorsement and Social Justice Values in Developing and Developed Societies: Comparing Jamaica and New Zealand Rosemary Frey University of Technology, Jamaica Lawrence Alfred Powell University of the West Indies-Mona Abstract Taking Weber’s Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism thesis as the point of departure, this paper compares work ethic endorsement pattens and social justice correlates in a developing society, Jamaica, and a developed society, New Zealand. A condensed version of Mirels and Garrett’s (1971) Protestant work ethic scale and related demographic and social-values-related measures were administered at Jamaican and New Zealand universities. High and low PE clusters were isolated, within each culture, among comparable samples of undergraduate social science students, and MANOVA applied to test effects of culture, protestant religious affiliation, and related ‘social justice values’ variables (welfare state support, redistribution, intergenerational equity, free enterprise, social distance from the disdvantaged, social Darwinism). Results suggest that there are significant cultural differences between high and low PE scorers on key justice-related societal values often seen as being associated with the Protestant work ethic. Possible reasons for the differences are advanced in the light of Jamaican and New Zealand social and political conditions.