What is a Dollar of Work? This could have an infinate numbers of answers. Lets start with a defination that seems to fit for the project that we have at hand. Wealth is your ability to produce goods or services that others can consume. 1 Dollar Work = 1 hr of an unskilled worker. If I am working on a project and have to learn something to do that job the value of that job is the length of time it would take for that unskilled worker to do the job. If you can do a job in 1 hr that it would take an unskilled worker 5 hours to do then in that skill you have 5X Dollars per hr or contract.