Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Economics

May 12, 2014

Want To Change A Nation? Give A Girl A Book

I don’t know any terrorists, but they seem to be very fearful people. They are afraid of new ideas, other religions, air strikes, and bathing. Nicholas Kristof, of The New York Times, says that what terrorists are really afraid of are educated women. Continue Reading...
May 08, 2014

Deirdre McCloskey on Ethics and Rhetoric in the ‘Great Enrichment’

In a marvelous speech on the origins of economic freedom (and its subsequent fruits), Deirdre McCloskey aptly crystallizes the deeper implications of her work on bourgeois virtues and bourgeois dignity. For example, though many doubted that those in once-socialistic India would come to see markets favorably, eventually those attitudes changed, and with it came prosperity. Continue Reading...
May 06, 2014

Now Available: ‘On Exchange and Usury’ by Thomas Cajetan

Christian’s Library Press has released a new translation of two treatises on exchange and usury by Thomas Cajetan (1469-1534), a Dominican theologian, philosopher, and cardinal. Although best known for his commentaries on the Summa of Thomas Aquinas, Cajetan also wrote dozens of other works, including short treatises on socioeconomic problems. Continue Reading...
April 30, 2014

If You Love Babies You Should Love Economic Growth

Today you’ll be hearing a lot about this latest bit of bad —really, really bad —economic news: Real gross domestic product — the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States — increased at an annual rate of 0.1 percent in the first quarter (that is, from the fourth quarter of 2013 to the first quarter of 2014), according to the “advance” estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Continue Reading...