Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Economics

January 24, 2013

Why Do the Wicked Prosper?

Why do the wicked prosper? This plaintive query is a consistent cry from the psalmist and the prophets. As Jeremiah puts it, “Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?” Continue Reading...
January 23, 2013

The economics of Downton Abbey

The wildly-popular BBC production, “Downton Abbey” has offices buzzing on Monday mornings. Like the “Upstairs, Downstairs” of old, “Downton” provides the viewer with two distinct lifestyles in one house: that of Lord and Lady of the manor and of the staff that runs the place. Continue Reading...
January 17, 2013

A Cookie for Me, But Not for Thee

There are some amazing economic and moral lessons, related to redistribution, zeo-sum fallacies, as well as virtue and desire, embedded in this Sesame Street video: Can you think of any other ways that both Ernie and Cookie Monster might have been able to be happy instead of sad? Continue Reading...
January 16, 2013

The Idle Ents

Last week I had the pleasure of participating in the First Kuyper Seminar, “Economics, Christianity & The Crisis: Towards a New Architectonic Critique,” held at the VU University Amsterdam. I gave a paper on “The Moral Challenges of Economic Equality and Diversity,” which focused on envy as a moral challenge particularly endemic to market economies: “Since envy arises out of inequality, envy and inequality go together. Continue Reading...
January 15, 2013

Access vs. Ownership in ‘Collaborative Consumption’

New rental markets are popping up all over the place, as detailed by a recent Wall Street Journal article. The trend is beginning to drive a larger movement labeled by some as “collaborative consumption,” wherein “sharing” is pushed as a way of “reinventing old market behaviors.” Continue Reading...
January 15, 2013

Samuel Gregg: Americans’ ‘Absurd Expectations’ and the Economic Crisis

Samuel Gregg, Acton’s Director of Research and author of the book “Becoming Europe“, says one of America’s real debt dangers is our increasing sense of entitlement from the government. In today’s Investor’s Business Daily editorial, Gregg states our “insatiable appetites” are getting us into the very deep economic trouble that no one, least of all politicians, seems to want to face: …Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker famously lamented in 2007: “We all know what to do, but we don’t know how to get re-elected once we have done it.” Continue Reading...
January 09, 2013

The Fiscal Cliff and the Fifth Commandment

America’s recent fiscal crisis has been delayed, not averted. Even if action is taken within the next few months to cut spending and/or raise taxes, the day of reckoning will only be slightly delayed since no one is willing to touch the three programs that constitute almost half the federal budget: Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Continue Reading...
January 09, 2013

New E-Zone Unemployment Rates Should Raise American Alarm

Record unemployment rates in Europe have been published and they should alarm Americans. Why? Because we are headed in the same direction. Nile Gardiner, of The Telegraph, is quite sure of this: The United States isn’t just gliding towards a continental European-style future of vast welfare systems, economic decline, and massive debts – it is accelerating towards it at full speed. Continue Reading...