Author Archive
Equality, Envy and Idolatry
Posted by: |My latest post over at the Common Sense Concept:
The poor in the US are doing very well compared to the poor in Kenya and enjoy things like quality housing, access to health care, basic education, and enough food so that obesity is their biggest nutritional threat. The rich in this country are also far better off than the rich in Kenya. There is a big difference in wealth between the richest and the poorest in both countries. This is clear evidence that the rich in the US need to be taxed more.
That’s essentially the case presented by Nate Roberts at Recovering Evangelical. Let’s restate the premises’ and conclusion of his argument:
Premise: The rich and the poor in the US are both far better off than the rich and the poor in Kenya.
Premise: Poverty is not life-threatening or grinding in the US.
Premise: The rich are really rich in the US.
Conclusion: We have a major problem that demands more taxes on the rich.
I agree with each premise, but in order for the conclusion to follow, one of two assumptions must first be true:
- There is a certain level of material wealth that is objectively immoral.
- There is a certain ratio of difference in material wealth between people that is objectively immoral.
Next, IF one or both of these assumptions are true; several secondary assumptions must also be true:
- It is possible to extract more taxes from the rich in the US.
- Increasing taxes on the rich will not change the overall system in a way that harms the poor.
- It is possible for government agents to redistribute income effectively so that it genuinely helps the poor and costs only the rich.
- It is possible to achieve and maintain a desirable ratio of difference in material wealth
- It is possible to accurately measure material wealth
Before examining each of the assumptions necessary for this argument to be true, I want to point out how bizarre it is that the article does not anywhere applaud the US for having essentially eliminated poverty of the type that exists in Kenya. The author is apparently much more concerned with the amount of luxury enjoyed by the rich than the amount of suffering endured by the poor. In reality, the poor the world over have seen tremendous improvement (most pronounced in countries with freer economies). Watch this stunning time-lapse graph from GapMinder and consider that in 1880, the average American lived to be 39 and made about $4,276. In 2000, there is not a country in the world with a life expectancy below 44. A very poor country like Angola, with a life expectancy of 48 and average inflation-adjusted income of $5,056, is better off than the US just a handful of generations ago.
But let’s examine the assumptions.
Primary Assumption: There is a certain level of material wealth that is objectively immoral.
What is it? I’ve never heard anyone willing to put a dollar amount or precise description of how much wealth is too much wealth for anyone to ever have. The closest you’ll get is the claim that the richest of the rich today have, “too much”. If that is true, vague as it is, are you willing to say that if you could flip a switch and tomorrow everyone in the world could enjoy Bill Gates’ standard of living you would not do it? Put another way, if a wealth-capping policy had been enacted a few hundred years ago, so that no one could live better than the richest kings and titans of trade and industry at that time, most of today’s middle class in America would have to reduce their standard of living.
Everyone seems to believe that some wealth is objectively moral – hence the efforts to get more of it to those with little – yet it is often claimed that at some point it becomes immoral. This is logically sloppy and morally empty. Biblically there is no evidence that a certain level of wealth is immoral. Wealth, like all earthly things, can be the object or tool of immorality, but is itself benign. It is the human heart, not the dollar, that commits sin.
Primary Assumption: There is a certain ratio of difference in material wealth between people that is objectively immoral.
What is that ratio? If the poorest in the world could be 20 times better off and thus avoid death, disease, starvation, etc, but only if the richest could be 40 times better off, would you oppose it? Would that be compassionate to the poor? Is reducing the wealth of the rich a more noble cause than relieving the suffering of the poor?
There is no logical or Biblical argument for a certain level of material equality. All such sentiments are thinly veiled envy, and materialist idolatry. To despise someone for their wealth and to desire them to have less of it (without even knowing the state of their heart) is a sin. To desire that people to have a more equal level of material wealth is to focus on materials rather than hearts. The obsession with how much people have relative to each other is revealing of an idolatry of both possessions and people. The standard by which we measure ought to be Christ, not others, and the thing we measure against that standard should be our hearts, not our stuff.
A world of incredible inequality of wealth but tremendous love, compassion, and humility is far better than a world with material equality and hate.
Let’s assume one of the primary assumptions IS correct. We still have several secondary assumptions to check:
Secondary Assumption: It is possible to extract more taxes from the rich in the US.
The richest 1% in the US account for 19% of the country’s total income and they pay 38% of the country’s total tax bill. The richest 5% earn 33% of the national income and pay 57% of the tax bill. The bottom 50% earn 19% of the income and pay 3% of the tax bill. (2007 data here). If you’ve never heard of the Laffer Curve, you might want to read up on it. Raising taxes on those already paying nearly all of them may not work as hoped.
Secondary Assumption: Increasing taxes on the rich will not change the overall system in a way that harms the poor.
Have you ever asked whether a (even somewhat) free-enterprise system and the inequality that comes with it is itself the driver of improved standards of living among the poor? If the cost of successful entrepreneurial activity is increased, will you get more or less of it? When an entrepreneur makes tons of money, do they do it by making something people value more than what they give up to get it? Does it create jobs and incomes and higher standards of living only for the rich? The ability to reap rewards is a great motivator that spurs innovation that helps everyone. The poor in America are getting richer, and at a faster rate than the rich! (As an aggregate group, and more importantly and powerfully, as individuals). Increasing the cost of success for the rich will also reduce wealth creation opportunities for the poor.
Secondary Assumption: It is possible for government agents to redistribute income effectively so that it genuinely helps the poor and costs only the rich.
What is the incentive of a government agency on poverty: to get rid of poverty and therefore eliminate the department, or to keep poverty alive, either in rhetoric or reality, to justify growing the department in power and resources? Humans are humans, and as such they are self-interested. A quick study of Public Choice Theory and the history of welfare programs and their inability to meet their own stated goals should bring this assumption into question. We may not like some things about reality, but we ought to consider whether the outcomes are better or worse when we turn to government to fix things. The evidence does not favor government.
Secondary Assumption: It is possible to achieve and maintain a desirable ratio of difference in material wealth.
If wealth was redistributed overnight so that everyone had an equal share, how long would that ratio last? Inequality is a part of life – it’s how we were created and it’s wonderful! We are different not only in ability, but in tastes. I would sacrifice a much higher income to have a career that allows me more time with my family – others would eschew having a family for more income. There is nothing immoral about the radical differences we were created with, and it is impossible to suppress them.
Secondary Assumption: It is possible to accurately measure material wealth.
In order to maintain a certain ratio of difference in wealth, we’d have to be able to measure wealth. What is it? Is it the dollar value of our stuff on the open market? If that were so, then someone in the mid 1990’s who had no food or shelter, but a giant pile of Beanie Babies would be wealthy, even as they died of starvation. A person in the dessert with no water but a bag of diamonds would be wealthy. Clearly, it is not the market price of our goods that determines our quality of life. Economic value is subjective. For some hermit monks, material wealth may actually make them less happy. If they have worked all their life to avoid the accumulation of possessions, and have only achieved it with great struggle and are now in a state of pure joy, are they to be counted as “poor”? Should we rush in to force goods upon them? When we attempt to aggregate and count wealth levels, all we are counting is the current market price for the goods people own. Real humans don’t care about these things except to the extent they help in reaching the actual goal, happiness.
Conclusion: Invalid, untrue and ineffective.
The idea that we must reduce inequality of wealth by taxing the rich is an ineffective means of achieving an immoral end.
The author ends the article with the famous “WWJD” question. We needn’t ask what Jesus would do in the face of great wealth and poverty. We can look at what he did do. He helped the poor and instructed others to do the same, but he never forced anyone to help on threat of fine or imprisonment as our tax and welfare system does. He told one rich man to give his possessions to the poor, but then let the man walk away. Apparently, it was the rich man’s heart, not his possessions, Jesus was after.
Don’t get caught in the web of envy and idolatry that lurks behind the desire for greater material equality among people. Seek to improve the lives of everyone, rich and poor, in ways that are genuinely meaningful, including but not limited to physical quality of life. Whatever ends you seek, don’t rely the on ineffective and immoral means of coercive government programs. Before you argue for something, check your assumptions.
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Note: In the rambling post, Roberts also points out with disgust the huge sums the US spends on its military. I am in complete agreement with the author that military spending in the US is appallingly high.
Tags: envy, equality, idolatry, poor, poverty, rich, wealth
Reconciling Rand and Jesus
Posted by: |There have been a number of articles lately about the apparent contradictions among small-government supporters who claim Ayn Rand as a hero and who are also religious. This is supposed to be some kind of “gotcha” moment where supporters of big-government point out the hypocrisy in their opponents’ beliefs. There is no hypocrisy in being a fan of both Rand and Jesus.
There are many ways in which Christianity and Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism are irreconcilable. Though both share a belief in an objective moral law, Objectivists would never attribute such a law to anything supernatural. Rand herself was no fan of religion and emphatically did not want her philosophy reconciled with Christianity.
However, most modern fans of Rand are not, nor do they claim to be, Objectivists. They are fans of her political philosophy, not necessarily the entire Objectivist ideal. Specifically, most Rand fans take away a few key insights: individualism is preferable to collectivism, success should not be punished nor failure rewarded, equality is a dangerous and unachievable goal, wealth is not inherently bad, and government can’t make everything better. None of these insights are antithetical to Christianity.
It is not hypocritical to consider someone with whom you do not agree 100 percent an intellectual hero. How many people praise the genius of Aristotle yet disagree with, for instance, his support of slavery? To find truth in Rand and Jesus does not make one a hypocrite any more than finding truth in Einstein and Newton.
Something Deeper
You do not owe anyone anything. No one owes you anything. Christians have a lot to gain from these powerful Randian insights.
Genuine acts of kindness are not motivated by guilt, fear, or shame. Yet modern religion is saturated with guilty consciences. Fear of sinning, guilt over your station in life, shame about your dreams and desires are commonplace in churches. These feelings are played like instruments by power-seeking ministers, activists, and politicians. The Kingdom of God brings freedom from this condemnation. Anytime you hear a pundit trying to motivate religious people by making them feel guilty, remember that you cannot truly give if you do not freely give. You do not owe anyone anything, but you are free to give everything.
Of course those who decry Randian ideas and favor bigger government are free to give away all they have too. They rarely do. More often they serve the poor by putting on fancy suits and going to fancy restaurants to lobby politicians to spend more of other people’s money. Then they call those other people selfish when they complain. Don’t buy it. Help those in need out of love, not guilt.
On the flipside, no one owes you anything. Nearly all political activism starts from the idea that someone owes you something. A job, a house, medical services, an aesthetically pleasing landscape, a low-fat diet, and on and on ad nauseam. The Christian idea of grace is the antithesis of this sentiment. You don’t deserve it.
The goal of material equality, or the idea that those with more owe those with less, is naked envy. Most people confuse the issue by believing the state, not another person, owes them something. The state has nothing to give but that which is first takes, and it takes from citizens. Your fellow citizens do not owe you anything. You are free to ask and you are free to receive, but you are not owed. What’s amazing is just how generous people can be in an environment of freedom.
Be Free
If you are a Christian who likes Rand you can ignore the cries of “hypocrite” from those with a political agenda. You needn’t defend or support every tenet of Objectivism to appreciate its political philosophy. There’s no contradiction between Christianity and Rand’s main thrust that individuals should be free.
Take to heart the Randian idea that you are not owed nor do you owe. There is a tremendous freedom in this that makes way for genuine giving and receiving, done with joy and motivated by love.
Cross-posted at CommonSenseConcept.org
Tags: Ayn Rand, Jesus, Objectivism, self-interest
Private Charity Isn’t Enough
Posted by: |“The idea that churches can tackle national poverty, take care of those who are ill, and rebuild communities after natural disasters requires a spoonful of bad moral theology and a cup of dishonesty.” - Robert Parham
In a recent blog post, EthicsDaily.com editor and Executive Director of Baptist Center for Ethics Robert Parham claimed that churches and charities could never do enough to alleviate poverty. I agree.
Poverty will never be “tackled” because it is a relative term; a moving target. If you could describe the plight of America’s poor today to a poor person in another country, or an American 100 years ago, they would conclude that poverty had been eliminated. The standard of living among the poorest Americans today is incredible by world and historical standards. Yet we still wage the war on poverty, even in America. This is not a bad thing – helping the down and out can be wonderful and is something Christians are called to. But when we aim at targets like the “end” of poverty, there is no end to what we can justify in order to reach this impossible goal. “The poor will always be with you.” The question for Christians is how best to reach them, spiritually and materially.
The second reason I agree with Parham’s claim is that, to the extent that poverty can be reduced, the church and private charity alone are simply too small to do it. The incredible gains in social and material welfare of the poor in America have not primarily resulted from charity, churches or governments. They have resulted from (mostly) free-market economies.
If we look at poverty in a vacuum as Parham does and ask how private charity compares to government efforts, we could conclude that private efforts are too small. But if we look at government and private efforts combined compared to the power of the market, they would be dwarfed so as to make them hardly important in the big scheme. Charity is a targeted and short-term salve for the wounded; its value is far more in its spiritual nourishment than any material progress it brings. A vibrant free-market is the only institution powerful enough to bring about the kind of dramatic increases in standard of living that most of us wish to see.
Public Choice
Jumping from the premise that private charity is not enough to the conclusion that government must do something places a blind, sometimes idolatrous faith in government that counters logic and experience. The incentive structure in government departments is to perpetuate and grow regardless of their effectiveness or the need for their services. There is no check on whether or not they are effective. In fact, the less effective a bureau of poverty relief is, the more they are rewarded with bigger budgets. If poverty is on the rise, and they will always claim it is so as to increase their importance, the last thing to do is cut the department of poverty relief!
Government programs are also subject to “capture” by interest groups and politicians. Scratch the surface of any government program and you will find that it is not the “general welfare” being promoted, but the welfare of a very small and politically connected group at the expense of the general welfare.
To examine private efforts and claim they cannot tackle a problem is only half the analysis needed. We must also examine government efforts and ask if they can tackle the same problem before we charge them to do it. The field of Public Choice Economics does just this, and you would be hard-pressed to find a case where the market is not providing something and getting government involved makes it better. If Christians have a duty to help the poor, they also have a duty to use their brains to discover ways that actually work. Intentions and actions are not enough, we need to understand how to be effective. This requires some knowledge of economic and political systems.
Wrong about Rights
The most damning and least supported claim in Parham’s article was that it is wrong for a Christian to value other people’s property rights:
“[L]ibertarian morality values property rights over human rights. For a Christian, that’s bad moral theology.”
I beg to differ. What Parham leaves unexplained is how human rights are to exist absent property rights. Private property is not some sacred dogma for its own sake; it is important because there is no other method of peacefully settling competing demands for limited resources. Such resources include food, water, shelter and other necessities of life. Common definitions or human rights include the right to be free from hunger. How can you have this right if you have no right to the very food you need to survive?
If Parham means by human rights the right to food, shelter, health care and other positive rights, this poses an incurable conundrum. Positive rights are a logical and practical impossibility. They cannot coexist with negative rights, or even with other positive rights.
A positive right is a right to something. A negative right is a right from something. A positive right obligates another person to take action. A negative right prohibits another person from taking action. A right to life, liberty or property is a negative right. You are free to live and act and justly acquire property, and no one can prohibit that so long as you are not violating their rights. A right to health care is a positive right. If you have the right to receive health care, someone else has an obligation to give it to you. If I am a doctor and you say you need my services, I am obligated to assist you in a world of positive rights. But what if at the same time I am hungry and need to eat rather than assist you in order to maintain good health? Our positive rights to health care cannot both be fulfilled, and in order for one of us to fulfill them we’d have to violate the other’s negative right to liberty and property.
Indeed, it is not possible to have any moral theology whatsoever without an acceptance of private property. One cannot give generously what one does not own, and one cannot help another by stealing from him.
Means and Ends
To sum up the argument, the author couldn’t imagine the church doing a task to his satisfaction, so his response was to ask men with guns to take money from people who presumably wouldn’t part with it voluntarily, and give it to causes he valued. Everything government does is backed by threat of force. Indeed, that is the only thing that distinguishes government from all other institutions. Let’s remove the intermediary agents (IRS, law enforcement) and revisit the argument with the author as the principal actor:
Churches can’t or won’t do as much to help the poor as Parham wants so he takes a gun door to door and says, “donate or else.”
That’s clearly a barbaric and inhumane way to a more civilized and humane world. Yet voting for people who will appoint people who will hire people who will send threatening letters promising agents with the ability to use lethal force if money isn’t sent to some other agents to spend on social causes is no different in moral terms. The means of the kingdom of God are service, sacrifice, grace and love. The means of all earthy kingdoms are brute force and the threat of it.
When the rich man refused to sell all his possessions and give the proceeds to the poor, Jesus did not send Peter and John after him to extract a percentage on threat of imprisonment. He let him walk away. We are to do the same.
Cross-posted at CommonSenseConcept.org
Tags: charity, Kingdom of God, public policy
Common Sense Concept
Posted by: |For those interested in reading more about the nexus of faith and free-enterprise, a new project has been launched by the American Enterprise Institute called the Common Sense Concept. It’s homepage has the following description:
“Common Sense Concept exists at the center of a new conversation about how things should be. Many years of poverty and stories of redemption have shown what works and what doesn’t. A generation that understands these truths will, finally, transform society. Be a part of it.”
The target market is evangelical college students and young adults. I don’t know exactly how effective it will be, nor do I support every policy position take by AEI. But when they asked me to contribute to their blog, I agreed. Here’s my inaugural post. I’ll be posting responses to articles probably once or twice a month. Hopefully this will continue to advance deeper thinking about political philosophy among Christians. I encourage LCC readers to check it out and lend your always insightful comments!
Tags: free market, Libertarian Websites, libertarianism
Burqa Bans and True European Values
Posted by: |Here’s a letter I had published in the Washington Post about 1 year ago:
French President Nicolas Sarkozy claims that banning burqas would uphold traditional European values. Unless he is referring to the values of a few infamous European dictators, he could not be more mistaken.
The bedrock of European cultural and political traditions is [classical] liberalism. A true liberal understands that the use of force, by which all government edicts are ultimately backed, is neither an effective nor moral means of promoting values. Banning an expression of religious conviction in the name of protecting a liberal culture is the stuff of satire.
Force is the tool of those who lack the competence or courage to peacefully persuade.
Isaac M. Morehouse, Falls Church
Tags: ethics, nanny state, religious freedom, statism
Norman Horn is the creator and primary writer for LCC. Learn a little bit about him in the 