> The concept is often credited with helping to define the societies of Northern, Central and Western Europe. Even though some of these countries were more affected by Lutheranism or Anglicanism than Calvinism, local Protestants nevertheless were influenced by these ideas to a varying degree. As penal law was enacted to uphold the uniform teachings of the Church of England in England, only various English dissenters held to those values. Among them were the Puritans who emigrated to New England, bringing the work ethic with them and helping define the culture of what would become the United States of America.
> Hard work and frugality were thought to be two important consequences of being one of the elect. Protestants were thus attracted to these qualities and supposed to strive for reaching them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_work_ethic
All of the dissent I see on that page is about whether or not capitalism is inherently protestant, and whether protestant work ethic explains the relative riches of northern protestant nations over southern catholic ones. While that's interesting economic ground to argue over, it's completely irrelevant to the social phenomena I'm trying to pin down.