An interesting Midrash:Midrash Tanchumah Parashas Beshalach Sif 20 says:
Rabbi Yehoshua says: When a person studies two halachos in the morning and two halachos in the evening, and is occupied (osaik) with his work all the day, he is considered as one who fulfills the entire Torah (kol hatorah kulo) and fulfills the verse, "And you shall meditate in it day and night." Rabbi shumon ben Yehoshuah said: We see from this that the study of Torah [all day - Ed] was designated for those who ate manna, for they had no need to work or to engage in commerce. ... This could also be said [of Kohanim] due to the terumah gift-offerings [they recieve].
It would seem from this that unless someone has somebody to support his family fully (like manna) in order to learn, a person should work. At the same time, since we do not give terumah today, to keep learning going, everyone who works should give money to Kollelim in order to support those who learn. This creates a balance, where when there are many people working, there is more money, and more people can choose to learn full time. When there are many people learning full time, there is less money to give, and some of them need to choose to go work. There is an equilibrium to be reached where the number working is enough to support the number learning with people not having to switch back and forth too much.
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