Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Business and Society

October 10, 2006

What Would Superman Do?

The latest take on the “What Would Jesus Do?” (WWJD) phenomenon is passed along by Allen Galbraith of Life is a Journal (HT: Lifehacker). Allen’s advice: “When dealing with difficult people imagine how one of your role models or heroes would deal with them.” Continue Reading...
October 10, 2006

The Hollywood Screenwriting Expo

The Templeton Foundation and Movieguide are sponsoring two panels at the upcoming Screenwriting Expo in Hollywood (Oct. 19-22). According to AgapePress (courtesy of The Church Report), “‘Christians in Hollywood’ and ‘Writing for the Family Film Market’ are the titles of two panels slated for what is billed as the world’s largest conference and trade show for screenwriters’.” Continue Reading...
October 09, 2006

Creating Equality by Consolidating Power

Can you find the tension in the lead sentence from this WSJ story on the annual Communist Party meeting in China? Here it is: “China’s ruling communist elite opened an annual meeting that will focus on policies for spreading the nation’s newfound prosperity more evenly and on President Hu Jintao’s attempts to further consolidate his power.” Continue Reading...
October 05, 2006

How Long Will Our Prosperity Cycle Last?

Mark Whitehouse reported in the September 25th issue of the Wall Street Journal that the living standards of average Americans will have to be adjusted downward in coming years because a larger share of our national debt is going to debt-service. Continue Reading...
October 04, 2006

Hollywood’s Faith in the Family

S.T. Karnick, who also blogs at The Reform Club, has some pretty solid and informative musings on popular culture. One of his most recent gems comes along with the news that Fox has created a new religion and family friendly division for its movie studios, named FoxFaith. Continue Reading...
September 19, 2006

The Evolution of Marketing

Last week, marketing guru Seth Godin quoted the 17th-century Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracián y Morales: Know how to sell your wares, Intrinsic quality isn’t enough. Not everyone bites at substance or looks for inner value. Continue Reading...
September 19, 2006

Prohibition, Blue Laws, and the Primum Usus Legis

A paper recently published at the National Bureau of Economic Research calls into question some conventional economic wisdom about the effects of certain kinds of legislation. In “The Church vs the Mall: What Happens When Religion Faces Increased Secular Competition?”, Continue Reading...
September 15, 2006

The Political Economy of Fantasy Sports

Although it is played by about 15 million Americans and amounting to a $1.5 billion a year industry, and even though it is a growing business and worth talking about, this post is not about the real-world economics of fantasy sports. Continue Reading...
September 13, 2006

Religious Leaders Bash the Global Market

Why do so many clergy and religious activists reflexively attack the free market? Kishore Jayabalan takes a look at recent anti-business campaigns. “The very concepts of business and profit motive are often reason enough for religious leaders to condemn an activity as immoral and unethical, and criticisms of multinational corporations are just the same condemnations on a larger scale,” he writes. Continue Reading...