Who else did you think would be the first to respond here? :)

The author raises a number of points I actually agree with, especially with regard to our lack of input over how taxes are spent. The most we can do is vote for candidates whose budgetary priorities are closest to our own, which is generally what I tend to do.

Society cannot exist without taxes, and surely something without which society cannot exist cannot be intrinsically immoral. The Catechism says we have a duty to pay taxes, as one of our many civic duties.

The question is, how high is too high? And this is a question the author does not address. Nor does she address the merits of different tax proposals, ranging from the progressive tax, the flat tax, the fair tax, etc. This may have been helpful.

But the weakest part of the argument is its inconsistency, since the author admits,

"Lest I start to sound really uncompassionate, if I honestly believed that taxing the rich would help the underprivileged, I'd reassess my beliefs."

So what of those who honestly do believe it? Do we have a moral case to make? In an article titled "the moral case against high taxation" - and I realize we don't get to name these pieces ourselves - to leave this loophole is to undermine the entire argument.

But my largest problem with arguments such as these in general is what they fail to mention.

It is not an injustice to distribute wealth through taxation, because almost all wealth in modern society is a social product made possible by the collective efforts of thousands, even millions of individuals. It is made possible through the basic economic infrastructure and educational system that the government provides; it is actually created by the labor of workers all over the world.

I would agree that taxes on wages and salary, payroll taxes, should be lowered. But the super-wealthy do not derive their super-incomes from salaries, but from ownership of the fruits of thousands of people's labor. To take an example, I shared with my friend RC the fact that the CEO of Wal-Mart in 2004 took home around 23 million in total compensation; only a little over 1 million of that is listed as salary, the rest as bonuses and stock options.

Thus when the author says that wealth must be earned, I have to wonder what the definition of "earned" is. If it means acquired through personal effort, surely ownership alone cannot qualify. It is the effort of others that is making the shares larger, the dividend checks fatter.

The president of the United States earns only 400,000 in salary every year. If his efforts during the course of a year are only worth that much, I find it extremely hard to believe that the efforts of anyone else could be worth 100 times that amount.

I'll close on this note: to me the long-term answer to societies ills is NOT simply raising taxes on the wealthy, though it is not an injustice to do so. The answer is in spreading and developing economic associations that enable those who create the wealth of society through their efforts to keep as much of it as they can for themselves. That means moving away from the labor market, which only awards people what their labor is worth, and towards the cooperative model, which awards people what their produce, their efforts are worth.

Bravo Kate Wicker! It's great to be treated to common sensical ideas every now and then.

Let us not forget what happened over 200 years ago when taxes became onerous and power was concentrated in the hands of a monarch across the Atlantic. Government is not about re-distributing wealth motivated by Chrisitian charity; it is about the concentration and wielding of power at the Federal level. The problem with far too many (Catholic) idealists is that they believe the motives of our goverment are reflections of our own. Only too late do we find out otherwise. Once people catch on, they become cynical about government, begin to withdraw their support and look for ways to subvert the power government attempts to wield. If it's happened before, it can happen again.

And, finally, what ever happened to the principle of subsidiarity when it comes to the government?

Yes, she should indeed have discussed this.



Granted, but even in the context of government action, wouldn't this be better accomplished by significantly raising the minimum wage rather than by collecting high taxes from the wealthy?

Think about it: mere taxation and redistribution will give the wealth to people who never did anything to create it, not just to the laboreres who helped create it.

The problem with high taxation is that it is discussed without the context in which taxes are needed.

Some things that the Government does are expensive. And expensive things need to be paid. You can try to keep Goverment from engaged into high expenses, or you have to accept that they have to be paid for.

Look at the cost of the war in Iraq. If you are against it, then you are right about not wanting higher taxes to pay for it. But if you believe it has to be fought, if you believe it is important, then you must be willing to pay for it. Wars are not cheap. And unfortunately it is one activity where the returns are nebulous and late-coming.

Think about the infrastructure problems. It was not that long ago that the Minnesotta bridge came down, and made prime time news. Other bridges may follow. These things have to be fixed, and have to be paid for. Do you want free trade? The price of free trade is a well maintained transportation network. And that costs money.

Think about the big bailout. A trillion of taxpayers money. And unfortunately those jerks who caused these mess have taken the ecomony hostage and we have no choice but to pay.

When the bills come, they have to be paid, and complaining that it stifles your creativity will not help you, as it does not help with *any* other bills.

Try telling the electric company that they should lower your rates becaue you'd be more productive if you did not have to pay them so much. Tell that to your landlord. Tell that to the bank when you are paying the mortgage.

As for spreading the wealth, well, let me tell you something. I have been a small business owner, and taxes were the least of my problems. My problem was getting customers and I learned that unless other people have money, they will not come buy from you. In business, the more the wealth is spread around, the more it will come back to you. Without wealth around, you have no business, and you won't have to pay taxes, because you have no income.

Joe, I absolutely agree some kind of tax system is necessary, but you say it's a question of how much is too much. I believe American taxpayers are paying too much and may be about to pay even more in the near future. As it stands, millions of American households with "taxable income" do not end up paying taxes because of credits and deductions under our current tax code. There's been an increasing trend for a smaller share of Americans to shoulder the entire country's tax burden. That's why I support the Fair Tax: http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer. I would have mentioned this as well as some of the other points you addressed if my word count could have been longer.

As for this comment: "Almost all wealth in modern society is a social product made possible by the collective efforts of thousands, even millions of individuals.

But what about the people who are able but aren't contributing to that "social product" by not working and/or not paying taxes? Do you support asking "the wealthiest 2% of families to give back a portion of the taxes they have received over the past eight years to ensure we are restoring fairness and returning to fiscal responsibility" (directly from Senator's Obama's tax plan) and then redistributing that income as checks to those who do not pay taxes and calling it a tax credit (instead of welfare)?

Also, you mention Wal-Mart's CEO. So many people start talking about the uber rich - celebrities, top CEOs, people whose wealth is not just in their income and who have plenty of tax shelters available to them when I begin talking about the problems with high taxation. However, you could say our current tax code defines rich as anyone who makes over $250,000. I know of a friend who runs a small businesses and often has to report a total income of over $250,000; yet, this is deceiving because a large portion of that money has to be invested back into her business (and her payroll) to keep it growing. She has said she will have to start cutting jobs if her taxes are raised anymore, so the high taxation not only hurts her personally but her payroll as well.

All this said, this is not my primary moral argument against high taxation. It's the fact that the government has a responsibility to fiscally and morally use taxpayers' money - especially if they are taking so much of it - and I just don't see politicians doing this.

God Bless,
Kate

Back in the days before political correctness, coercively taking people's money was called stealing.

What hasn't been mentioned is the implied notion that coercively confiscating from wealthy systemically abolishes the greedy and corrupt. Even Christ Himself was unable (or willing) to perform that miracle. The greedy and corrupt will rise in every economic platform and condition.


There won't be one less golf game for the rich in a system where you strip them of their wealth. They'll simply lay off their workers and cut back on charity. Greed is as greed does.

Public welfare enables poverty. Generation after generation.

For the poor to succeed, we fight for good teachers and schools in their neighborhoods, drive out the drug dealers, teach them how to handle their money, improve their housing, give them solid priests to ignite their faith.

"But what about the people who are able but aren't contributing to that "social product" by not working and/or not paying taxes? Do you support asking "the wealthiest 2% of families to give back a portion of the taxes they have received over the past eight years to ensure we are restoring fairness and returning to fiscal responsibility" (directly from Senator's Obama's tax plan) and then redistributing that income as checks to those who do not pay taxes and calling it a tax credit (instead of welfare)?"

There are different categories here. For the people not working, it depends on why; the real unemployment rate is over 10%. Some people simply cannot find work.

But as for this "not paying taxes" line, it's a conservative talking point. Everyone who works is hit by the payroll tax, whether they pay the income tax or not. If you're employed, you're paying taxes. And that's still the vast majority of Americans.

Others who can't work or pay taxes, like housewives and children, need what taxes provide; schools, roads, medical services, etc. Not that I have anything against home schooling, but with the economy the way it is, a lot of moms have to work and send their kids to sub-standard schools. When kids get bad educations, the economy suffers greatly in the long term. You can't outsource everything.

As for what the tax code defines as rich, that can always be changed. What I know is that this countries wealthiest 400 individuals have a combined worth of 1.6 trillion dollars, more than most of the countries in the world's GDP. That is irrational madness.

When are we going to start talking about how intrinsically immoral it is to horde wealth beyond what one needs, to spend lavishly on luxury items and vacations when people in this world are cold, hungry and diseased, to concentrate wealth in such massive amounts that it leads to the complete corruption of the political process, to reduce everything and every person to a commodity to be bought and sold like an object, to evade paying any taxes whatsoever, and to apologize, justify and cover-up for this activity with Enlightenment ideologies that the Church never endorsed and often times opposed to begin with?

Forgive me if I'm suspicious of those who only tend to see sin, evil, and immorality whenever anyone suggests that these are problems worth addressing through policy. And no, I'm not talking about you in particular Kate. But they're around.

Hello!
My friend Joe, with whom I share membership in the most unusual little club I've ever joined (an odd sort of mutual admiration/utter disagreement society), has a point when he says,

...and adds that it's inconsistent to be opposed to the higher taxes as if by a moral principle, but then express that if they'd really help, one would support them...as if a moral principle were to be sacrificed when we really need to.

This is not to slam you, Kate, with whom I largely agree! But it highlights a problem of precision or specificity, which those of us who favor keeping taxes low need to explain, for our arguments to be properly understood (not least by ourselves!).

Starting From First Principles
Government uses force to achieve its ends. For this reason it has a realm of core competency: The tasks for which it is suited, for which no other organization is suited, because other organizations have not been granted, by We The People, a monopoly on the use of force (excepting self-defense in the gravest extreme).

In a perfect world, then -- or if we were designing a government from the ground up as the Founding Fathers did -- we might say, "Let government do only those things which lie in its core competency (involving force) and nothing outside." This would mean national government would limit itself to four
tasks:

Core Competencies
(a.) The actual act of governance (legislative, judicial, and executive offices)
(b.) Defense of the Nation by arms
(c.) Defense of the Innocent by law enforcement (includes federal judiciary)
(d.) Establishment of those standards which by themselves are arbitrary but which are needed for infrastructure and public order, at a national scale affecting such things as interstate commerce

And we see that this is what the Founders actually did -- the Federal government being so limited Constitutionally that such things as disaster relief and public libraries were long resisted on the basis that there was no constitutional authorization.

But then corruption and the Civil War era softened that line, and then FDR's court-packing threat obliterated it altogether, cowing the Supreme Court into permitting programs its conscience and jurisprudence said were unconstitutional. We now live in a country where it is impossible not to include entitlements among the roles which government plays, even if we wish it didn't.

So: Returning to the argument about specificity:

Someone being doctrinaire about the Proper Role of Government would say that entitlements should be 0% of the Federal Budget.

This would be salutary in several ways:
- No more budget deficits
- Reduced taxes and attendant economic & job growth
- No more moral quandary about using government force to take from those who earn to grant to those who don't, which is an immoral use of force whereas self-defense is not
- Remove class warfare from politics
- Undo the damage to the churches and benefactors through the usurpation of their philanthropic role
- Undo the damage to the dignity, humility, and conscience of those receiving aid through the shame of taking unjustly from others, the presumption of being entitled to do so, and the use of power politics and Mau-Mauing to extort increases in allotments

...but nobody imagines for a moment that it's about to happen.

...continued...

...continued...

Lesser of Two Evils
Which is why those of us who'd theoretically like to see that happen (over some gradual transition period, of course) are willing to give a nod to reality and say, okay, since that's not going to happen, how can we constrain the improper use of government?

Now, notice that this represents, at the outset, a sacrifice of moral purity. We're saying: We can't get what's right, so what's the best we can get? (It's a lot like voting, don'tcha know?)

This is why:
(a.) Our proposals aren't specific. (The specific one is impossible, so we do what we can to move in the right general direction.)
(b.) We don't seem to be referring to any obvious moral principle. (We are, but circumstances force us to choose between the lesser of two evils; those comparing McCain, who's wobbly on stem-cells and embryos, to Obama, who's Obama, on the life issue will understand the dilemma.)

Proposal
With this understood, I would like to propose a Constititutional Amendment. (What the hey; we're all sitting around here bloviating like our words are going to have any impact on governance; we might as well pretend with gusto.)

I haven't the knack to craft the language such that it'll look good on parchment or vellum. But the gist of it is as follows:

"Let the portion of each year's Federal Budget to be spent on purposes other than the aforementioned Four Core Competencies be limited to 50% of the Federal Revenues of the previous year. This allocation shall include Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other entitlement spending, budgeted and emergency. Transition to be achieved over ten years, with the percentage being reduced by an equal amount in each year until it reaches 50% in the tenth year."

As you can see, this represents a major compromise with the moral evil of using government force for purposes for which force cannot be morally justified. Going from 0% to 50% is in some ways the very definition of compromise: Splitting the thing down the middle. (In fact it's more than a compromise, because even now we're not spending 100% on inappropriate programs.)

But it's a move in the right direction. And it's a specific move. And it acknowledges the moral principle, even while acknowledging defeat in achieving it.

-- R.C.

Wow,

Unreal. This is why we pro-life democrats are so confused these days, and why we will continue to be democrats! Although we accept that abortion is an abomination and an outrage, we cannot help but suspect that some adopt a pro-life position, not out a loving concern for the victims, but rather a desire to enforce a personal set of cultural norms.

We are spending $10 Billion a week in Iraq (much of it on programs involving infrastructure and community development) and our pro-life President has developed a plan to send $700 Billion to Wall St. investment bankers, but the discussion here seems to center on methods for reducing federal support for the poor.

Face it - when we finally succeed in ending abortion, this will certainly increase the need for government programs for women and infants. America currently ranks 29th among nations in the incidence of infant mortality as it is. . . 29TH! Do we value THESE innocent lives? Where is the OUTRAGE? Where are the articles in the Catholic press? Why can't we see that being outspoken on this issue - and pointing out to the pro-abortion liberals that this is the SAME issue as abortion - would assist us in our effort to end abortion?

In “A Modest Proposal,” the great Irish writer Jonathon Swift satirically proposes a plan to end poverty. One of the advantages of this plan is;

"that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas! too frequent among us, sacrificing the poor innocent babes."

The answer? Eat them.

One last thought; I just, in fact, returned from a visit to family in Ireland. Huge Obama fans over there. After mass, the priest came after me to show me the Obama/Biden pin he had on his lapel. If Obama wins, don’t be too surprised if you see a good deal of celebrating in places you might not expect it.

Be well, pray hard, God bless,

MDO

I don't think anyone in the U.S. isn't aware, at this point, that celebration in Europe, Syria, Russia, Iran, China, North Korea, and Venezuela will not equal or exceed celebration among black Americans. Given their respective national interests, and the left-leaning propagandist nature of their largely government-operated news media, how could it be otherwise?

The places where there will not be celebrating: Iraq (apart from AQI, of course), Pakistan (apart from the Tribal regions, of course), Taiwan (apart from the mainland reunification agitators, of course), Columbia (apart from FARC, of course).

NHCatholic, what surprises me about your post is not that declaration. It is that you are so absorbed by the European mindset as to not believe in voluntary charity for the needy -- neither its existence, nor its morally obligatory magnitude (10% pre-tax minimum, plus some additional portion in proportion with one's relative wealth).

Of course I can only guess at that last part -- since you label yourself as both a Democrat and therefore fall into the categories least associated with generosity in private almsgiving. For all I know you give both above and beyond the moral minimums of your money, time, and talent.

If you don't, though, then...what gall to accuse others of proposing "eating the poor!"

But above and beyond that, consider that you have mis-characterized the argument of those with whom you disagree politically (not an uncommon tactic in American politics, but shame on you if you used it intentionally).

The conservatives want assistance to the poor to be increased, not decreased. They, however, wish that assistance to be limited to:
(a.) methods that are morally permissible, not methods which are morally impermissible (because the ends cannot justify immoral means);
(b.) methods which actually help the poor, not methods which do equal harm and good, or more harm than good, and only unequivocally serve to good to the re-election campaigns of the politicians that champion them, or the Radical-Chic community organizers who institutionalize the threat of street violence by mau-mauing government bureaucrats.

The difference between you and them, then, is:
(a.) Statistically, given your own self-description, you probably do less to help the poor than they;
(b.) You don't know or agree that government wealth-transfer is an immoral use of force by some men against others, unjustifiable under any "just war" or comparable doctrine;
(c.) You don't know or agree that such programs do harm to the poor which equals or outstrips the good.

About item (a.), if it be true (and again, I can only go by national statistics to say it is, because I didn't do your taxes), only you can apply corrective measures.

About items (b.) and (c.) we may have a fruitful debate, if you choose.

But that would require you give up mis-characterizing your opponents. That, too, is an area where only you can apply corrective measures.

Respectfully,

R.C.

Some errata:

...should of course be, "North Korea, and Venezuela will equal or exceed celebration among black Americans."

And,

...where I meant to say, "as both a Democrat and therefore fall into the category...." (I had considered whether this might be an opportunity to give cradle-Catholics a good-natured poke in the ribs for how they're out-tithed by their separated brethren. But I decided against, because it's off-topic, and anyway I had no way to know whether NHCatholic was a cradle-Catholic or not.)

And,

...should be, "only unequivocally serve to do good to the re-election campaigns..."

Sorry for the typos. How I wish (not for the first time) that we could edit posts for a little while after posting! Still, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

I just wanted to point out:

Joe H is absolutely correct when he says that the poor pay Payroll Taxes.

Now, the Earned Income Tax Credit does largely obliterate the cost of Payroll Taxes for poor and lower-middle-class families. (I can only say "largely" because it sometimes does so completely; it sometimes does so almost. Keep in mind that I'm computing payroll taxes here as roughly 15% of income, not roughly 7%, because employers consider paying payroll taxes part of the cost of having an employee, and naturally pass "their portion of the tax" on to their employees in the form of reduced pay.)

My point is that, one cannot argue about the percentages of all Federal Income Taxes that are paid by the rich and the poor respectively, without first pointing out that Payroll Taxes do represent a flat or even regressive (remember the upper limit) tax on income, and then pointing out the role of the EITC in eliminating that caveat.

After you make that proviso, you're free to go on saying how the wealthy in the U.S. pay 40% of all income taxes, while only making 20% of the income...or whatever the appropriate numbers may be.

We can probably all agree that when the barbarians are at the gate and everyone is in the castle keep, huddled together, trying to find things to throw over the walls, 100% taxation is an appropriate standard. Private property ceases to be relevant when immediate death is the other option.

This doesn't mean I support any taxation to create 'wealth redistribution.' It's not the level of taxation that is wrong - it's the purpose for which the taxes are being employed. The government should not be taking money from a person who got it legally and giving it to another person to make that second person happy, productive, or anything other than physically safe from criminals or threats to the whole nation (certainly external enemies, perhaps epidemics or famine).

Replacing charity with welfare replaces the opportunity for virtue with the incentive for vice.

I have a post in the 'Money: Making it,...' thread that discusses this in more detail.

I believe 2000 years of martyrs in Christendom graciously beg your pardon indeed!

When you start watching what people purchase and where they go on vacation and claim they are nefarious and responsible for poverty, democracy and free enterprise are enemies of the Popes and Catholicism, suspicion is cranking in overdrive.

RC,

The people of the entire world are going to be celebrating when Obama gets elected, because most of the world is actually to the left of the US on social and economic matters. My guess is that they will be just as happy in France and Denmark as they will be in Venezuela. In fact, if Hugo Chavez has any brains and has learned anything at all from Fidel Castro, it is that Democrats can't be counted on to be friendly just because you lean left. I don't recall Kennedy, Johnson, Carter or Clinton ever giving a supposedly left-wing dictator a free pass, even if the first choice was diplomacy instead of the arms-race.

I do however recall that Reagan was cozy with Pinochet and the Latin American death squads, not to mention Islamic fundamentalists, not to mention Saddam Hussein, not mention anyone else, no matter how vile, simply because they were the enemy of the enemy.

When the right does it, it is "tactics" - when the Democrats do it, its sleeping with the enemy, its because they supposedly ideologically agree. Yawn, snore, snooze.

As for your four competencies, come on man, this isn't 1776.

We need to justly distribute wealth by using it to improve the society that we all sustain through our labor. That is how we ought to think of taxation.

We are not a nation of yeoman farmers anymore, where each of us is our own little society and the imposition of a tax for anything beyond defense and the courts seems alien and hostile.

We have all been reduced to undifferentiated, abstract wealth creators, fractions of the total national and even global wealth. In 1776 few men were islands but most families and extended families were; only rural pockets remain.

We live in a vastly more complex economy which requires that education, health services, scientific research, alternative energy and other services be the focus of a major social investment. It is time to stop looking at these things as "goodies", and start recognizing them as essential to survival in the 21st century.

It is because Obama gets it, and the rest of the world gets it too, that they will be celebrating when he takes office. I will be praying for the next four years that he doesn't get to enact FOCA, and that he does get to do all of the rest.

Let us not forget the Catechism of the Church...as Richard John Neuhaus wrote in his book, Catholic Matters:

"It is true that, as the sixteenth-century St. Ignatius of Loyola put it, we should think with the Church (sentire cum ecclesia). It is also true that thinking with the Church begins with thinking. Faithful assent is not a matter of standing to attention, clicking one's heels, and saluting at the appearance of every document from Rome. Rather, it is a matter of thinking for myself so that I can think with the Church, the prior assumption being that the Church possesses a teaching charism and authority that warrants my assent. I think for myself not to come up with my own teaching but to make the Church's teaching my own. That is not always easy to do. People say they have difficulty with one teaching or another. That is not necessarily a problem. The problem arises when we assume that the problem is with the teaching and not with ourselves. The great nineteenth-century theologian Cardinal John Henry Newman said, 'Ten thousand difficulties do not add up to a doubt."



The Catechism reads:

1882
Certain societies, such as the family and the state, correspond more directly to the nature of man; they are necessary to him. To promote the participation of the greatest number in the life of a society, the creation of voluntary associations and institutions must be encouraged "on both national and international levels, which relate to economic and social goals, to cultural and recreational activities, to sport, to various professions, and to political affairs."5 This "socialization" also expresses the natural tendency for human beings to associate with one another for the sake of attaining objectives that exceed individual capacities. It develops the qualities of the person, especially the sense of initiative and responsibility, and helps guarantee his rights.6

1883
Socialization also presents dangers. Excessive intervention by the state can threaten personal freedom and initiative. The teaching of the Church has elaborated the principle of subsidiarity, according to which "a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to co-ordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good."7

1884
God has not willed to reserve to himself all exercise of power. He entrusts to every creature the functions it is capable of performing, according to the capacities of its own nature. This mode of governance ought to be followed in social life. The way God acts in governing the world, which bears witness to such great regard for human freedom, should inspire the wisdom of those who govern human communities. They should behave as ministers of divine providence.

1885
The principle of subsidiarity is opposed to all forms of collectivism. It sets limits for state intervention. It aims at harmonizing the relationships between individuals and societies. It tends toward the establishment of true international order.

Then tell me why the rest of the world beats a path to our door via immigration? What do we not get that the Chavezs of the world do? Obamabots are a scary scary bunch.

People who confuse fact and opinion.

Read the polls, Publius. In a survey of over 70 countries, the people vastly prefer Obama to McCain, with two exceptions: Georgia and the Philippines.

And, it is just a fact that most of the world is to the left of us on these issues. You don't have to like that fact, or think it is a good thing. But it's still true.

The whole world wants Obama to be president. Love it, hate it, register indifference to it, but there's no point in denying it.

I wouldn't be counting the Obama Chickens just yet. There's an army of aborted babies who are not in his corner and a Rosary Novena. We'll just have to see how it all plays out.

In any event, this is America. Any attempt to start a-knocking on our doors to take our possessions will see a civil war.Maybe that's what it will finally take to defend the millions of innocent babies being massacred?

Given the fact that Obama was packaged nicely for public consumption, the poll numbers are not surprising. The polls are meaningless. His economic policies are based on envy. With the help of his minions in the "party of death" Obama will sign FOCA, sign a repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, pursue the Fairness Doctrine to shut down talk radio, and who knows what else. Obama is scary, Joe, and the Obamabots who cry and pass out when he speaks are even scarier.

Really? The whole world.

He's got the whole world in his hands.
He's got the whole wide world in his hands.
He's got the whole world in his hands.

He's got the itty bitty baby in his hands. He's got the itty bitty baby in his hands.

Come on kiddies, sing.

He's got the itty bitty baby in his hands. He's got the whole world in his hands.

Is it me, or has the oxygen been sucked out of this cyberroom?

Yeah the oxygen levels are quote low - I'm going to go find some fresh air. Have fun with your polls, Joe.

Read the encyclical Rerum Novarum by Pope Leo XIII. It was affirmed in two later encyclicals, including one by John Paul II. Here is a summary of its points:

Many people are not aware that the Catholic Church also opposes socialism and mandated wealth redistribution for 3 main reasons:

1. It robs the lawful posessor of the wealth (stealing)
2. It hurts the recipient in the end (they should be entitled to hope for and to keep whatever wealth they acquire too)
3. It distorts the role of the state

On the last point, the Church teaches the principle of subsidiarity, which is that higher levels of community, such as the state, should only perform functions not better performed by lower levels of community, such as families and charities.

The church teaches that the wealthy have an obligation to the poor, but that this is a PERSONAL DUTY, not something the state should mandate or control. Furthermore, the oblication should be personal in nature (ie, get involved), whereas state programs separate the giver from the receiver.

The church discourages class welfare and contends that envy of the rich is a violation of the 9th commandment.

Furthermore, the poor are told “to have nothing to do with men of evil principles, who work upon the people with artful promises of great results, and excite foolish hopes which usually end in useless regrets and grievous loss.”

And to conclude:

“Here again the principle of subsidiarity must be respected….By intervening directly and depriving society of its responsibility, the Social Assistance State leads to a loss of human energies and an inordinate increase of public agencies, which are dominated more by bureaucratic ways of thinking than by concern for serving their clients, and which are accompanied by an enormous increase in spending. In fact, it would appear that needs are best understood and satisfied by people who are closest to them and who act as neighbours to those in need.”

Quote by: John Paul II, From Centesimus Annus, Encyclical on 100th anniversary of Rerum Novarum, 1991

Please explain why we should care who the rest of the world wants for president - I'm not being sarcastic, I really don't understand, could you explain? Maybe I'm getting tired.

First, I'll respond to civility.

Meg,

RC brought up the notion that overseas dictators will be celebrating when Obama wins. I merely wished to point out that, in fact, most of the people outside of the US will be celebrating as well.

To me it does matter, because I'm not a nationalist. What the world thinks is important. I'm a human being and a Catholic, and that makes me part of something bigger than the American nation-state.

For the snarky ones:

Again, I'm simply pointing out the facts. I know you all know the difference between fact and opinion. I mean, you can be as cute and sarcastic as you like about it, and stare daggers at me and everyone else you don't like politically all day long. It isn't going to change reality. But, hey, good luck with whatever gets you through what is sure to be a very troubling time for you.

This is already quite a long thread, so pleaes forgive me if this has already been said, but I'd just like to point out one thing:

as you note, taxes pay big government, not hungry babies.

The nice thing about the American welfare system is that it is, for the most part, very subsidiarist, controlled at the state, rather than the federal, level. State policies on Medicaid, etc., vary quite drastically, as they should.

As I've noted before in economic threads here, I'm no longer the "capitalist Republican" I used to be, but that doesn't make me a Democrat by any means. It is very important that the biggest chunk of the federal budget goes to the military. All the welfare programs only amount to a small fraction of the federal budget, so it is ridiculous for anyone to say that our tax rate supports welfare programs.

If we stripped the military down to the defensive force it's supposed to be, and stripped most of the pork, we could still have Medicaid, Social Security, etc., and pay a lot lower tax rate.

That said, on the other hand, Catholic teaching (see _Mater et Magistra_) says that, while we have the right to own private property and profit from our endeavours, we do not have the righ to all the property we desire. Greed is a sin, and, as a conservative, I believe the role of government is to punish sin, whether the sin is greed or abortion.

Please indicate how one can send an email to the editor(s) of IC. I have tried an obvious method without success. I have two questions for them

The problem here is that people have their own subjective definitions of “high taxes”, “socialism”, “too much government”, etc. It is all too easy to look at someone’s idea, put a label on it, declare that the Church has condemned it, and walk away. The problem is that a lot of the time, what someone personally thinks a word or phrase means, may not be how the Church sees it, or how someone else sees it.

We should probably first begin by getting over the idea that we have a monopoly on definitions. If we are in disagreement over a word or a concept, we should first define that concept in a mutually agreeable way. Otherwise, as I know from too many repeated personal experiences, we just talk over one another without any increase in understanding.

Here is what I think we can all agree on: we have a moral obligation to pay taxes. Paragraph 2240 of the Catechism is clear about that. All government expenditures are redistributions of someone’s wealth; I would also hope we could all agree to that. If we do, then we agree that the moral obligation of paying taxes also includes the moral obligation of the government to redistribute that wealth. So, I hope we can agree that redistribution of wealth is not intrinsically or categorically immoral.

The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church is also quite clear on the matter of wealth redistribution. Paragraph 303 reads:

“Authentic economic well-being is pursued also by means of suitable social policies for the redistribution of income which, taking general conditions into account, look at merit as well as at the need of each citizen. ”

For specific cases in which the Church claims that it is necessary, please see paragraphs 300 and 363 of the Compendium.

With respect to the great ideological dispute between us: the Church rejects particular conceptions of both capitalism and socialism. The problem here is again definitional, to an even greater degree. We all want to believe that our definitions are the right ones, but what is most important is that we align ourselves with what the Church actually teaches.

What I mean is, it is not enough for an American to look at a policy he doesn’t like, claim it is “socialism”, then claim that it must therefore be rejected by Catholics because the Church rejects socialism; it is likewise not enough for a European to do the same with respect to policies they don’t like with the word capitalism. We will probably always disagree on what these words mean to us, but we can choose to accept or reject those specific items that the Church is condemning under these headings.

(to be continued)

Paragraph 2425 of the Catechism is fairly clear on this. It reads:

“The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with "communism" or "socialism." She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of "capitalism," individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for "there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market." Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended.”

What is important to note here is the following: what is rejected in socialism, and what is rejected in capitalism? What is rejected in socialism is atheism, totalitarianism, and a strictly command economy; what is rejected in capitalism is individualism and the “absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor.”

I might first point out that without the law of the marketplace over human labor, we would be hard pressed to call a system capitalistic, but that is besides the point. Here we also see that the Church commends “reasonable regulation”. So once again, we should be able to agree - economic regulation is not intrinsically or categorically immoral. It is not so because the market cannot satisfy all human needs.

I reiterate my final point about taxation: that the vast fortunes of the wealthy upon which the supposedly evil Democrats only want to raise taxes upon by a mere 3%, back to Clinton-era levels, are made possible by the labor of the workers of the world. It is barely a beginning to genuine justice when such a small portion of those fortunes are taxed and invested in social projects from education and healthcare to roads and bridges so that everyone in society may benefit from them. By and large these are services that, at least as of right now, we cannot provide for ourselves. I don’t have an MRI machine in my house, do you?

Finally, I am longing to see the day when the conservatives and libertarians here condemn, with the same vigor they do government spending, the greed of the ruling elite in this country, its bottomless appetite for luxurious distractions while billions of human beings in this world want for the necessities of life. Paragraph 303 of the Compendium states,

“Wealth is a good that comes from God and is to be used by its owner and made to circulate so that even the needy may enjoy it. Evil is seen in the immoderate attachment to riches and the desire to hoard.”

Think about it.

Hi Richard,

You can email me at:

saint-paul at insidecatholic.com

Joe,

Taking sentences out of context from the "compendium" and sound bites out of encyclicals to say the Church teaches something when it isn't so, the frantic, long-winded, almost obsessive postings saying things like the "whole world wants Obama", is so outlandish, it rises to the level of delusions from a cult.

The intellectual and spiritual insanity is a frightening thing to watch for people still tethered to the Ark.

Folks, keep your path to the Confessional, followed by the Eucharist, well worn. Make sure you have materials that solidly lead your conscience. Pray the Rosary, strive for daily. Get a good book on how your ego operates - the little voice that constantly puts thoughts before your intellect - observe it and then master it. (A lot of the books out there are new agey, pagan in that the god is inside of that voice. However, Christendom and in particular Catholicism can utilize the information in them to master/kibosh. "A New Earth" b Eckhart Tolle is a good start.

Craig,

Do you have an argument, or do you just make assertion after assertion without ever backing it up?

Regarding the whole world thing, it's just true. Look at the polls, I didn't take them, I didn't make them up. Overwhelming majorities in every country. If only they knew about Ayers, right? Snore.

I hate that it comes to this, but no, Craig, I'm not a fanatic. I'm just a regular guy with an education and strong opinions on politics. I listen to reason when it is presented to me. All you've ever given me is sarcasm and grief. It isn't necessary. I'll listen to what you have to say if that's what you really want me to do.

Joe,

Brother, people need not spend time responding to ludicrous assertions.That you are unable to see the absurdity in a "poll" that says concludes the whole world wants Obama speaks for itself. This is what makes the Obama cult all so very peculiar.

The fact that Obama's allies are terrorists, has discredited religion and his own religion for 20 years was worshiping getting back at whitey, is ashamed of America, promotes dismembering infants alive, says he will bomb Pakistan, make war with Iran - not to mention that his middle name is Hussein and he won't produce his birth certificate, 50+ members of a previously craven Episcopate has stood in the public square and said Catholics are forbidden from voting for a pro-abortion politician because the right to life takes precedence above all other credentials - actually stands on it's own merits about whether you listen to reason when it is presented to you.

Half of what you're saying is simply nonsense circulated by the far, far, so far they're almost a dot on the horizon right-wing. This birth certificate nonsense, for one. And what about his middle name? Could anything be less relevant?

I think a reasonable man would either declare all of the other people, Republicans who worked with Ronald Reagan included, on the Woods board with Ayers also "allied with terrorists" or simply drop the matter.

But you're right about his foreign policy - I don't like it, but I don't like McCain's either.

What is it about the poll you don't get, exactly? It's just some people in an office calling up people in other places, asking them questions, and recording the results. It's not a vast conspiracy theory to make your guy look bad and the other guy look good. International polling is done all the time. Is there some methodological flaw you want to call our attention to?

It's not that important anyway. I think a reasonable person would see that I only brought it up in response to someone else's claim that dictators would be celebrating an Obama victory. No one even polled them.

I'm not in love with Barack, ok? I'm more thoroughly repulsed by McCain and especially Palin.

Joe:

I understand exactly where you're coming from, emotionally...despite our disagreements.

You say:...whereas I say the converse:

I'm not in love with McCain and while I think Palin's instincts and attitudes are more sound than McCain's, her experience level on national-scale issues is two years shy of what I'd prefer and, on international, about four years, despite the fact that she's apparently a quick study.

But I'm not in love with Biden and especially Obama (to put seniority in first place, as you did). Biden's experience in foreign-policy has been to be uniformly wrong in nearly every pronouncement he's made on international topics in the last decade. But one gets the sense that he was mostly talking off-the-cuff and could be talked out of those positions if given advice by serious persons. Obama, though, I find disappointingly repugnant. "Disappointingly," because I'd have liked the first African-American with a plausible shot at the White House to have been worthy of the office. His choice of friends is atrocious, his connections to the corrupt or criminal thick on the ground, his political history an embarrassment of inaction or bad action, his personal history full of questions and long silences.

And, with the only exceptions being the denizens of the Code Pink/Democratic Underground moonbat extreme leftists, every single person who supports him says things like, "I only hope that he doesn't really mean, or won't really get a chance to enact, some of the things he's said." Or, "I only hope he's more moderate than his history suggests or doesn't live up to the expectations set by his political associations."

My point being: I can be civil with you, Joe, despite our disagreements, by putting myself in your shoes and saying, "What if I shuddered instinctively at the G.O.P. team the way I shudder at the Democratic team?"

That doesn't mean I won't question you on a logical basis. I mean, if you really are worried he'll pass FOCA (as he's stated he will), or that he'll ensconce more anti-human-dignity justices (as he's stated he will), why not work assiduously for his defeat, on those grounds?

Or is the symbolism of "the first black president" really so important as to overwhelm the importance of such issues?

Yes, I know: Obama's full of rhetoric about helping the poor. Let's say his policies would actually help, and have no side effects (two things you know I disagree with vehemently, but let's allow it for the sake of argument). It remains true, nonetheless, that the number of poor people dying in America in a decade because of non-self-inflicted poverty wouldn't begin to approach the number being aborted monthly. FOCA would destroy the ability of even the states to stem that bloody tide; and the replacement of anti-life old justices (or perhaps even a pro-life one) with anti-life young justices would prevent its being overturned anytime soon...probably any time in my lifetime.

So where's the logic, Joe? Why not vote for his defeat, even if it means voting for a pair as execrable (in your view) as McCain/Palin? Choosing the lesser of several evils is just one of the sad necessities of adult life. Call it an emulation of St. Catherine of Sienna, who was able to overcome something rather more repulsive than voting for a bad ticket when helping a cancer patient. What else is the culture of death but a metastasizing cancer at the heart of our republic's ballyhooed vow to protect a person's life, liberty, and property?

But I digress. My point, again, is: I will respect Joe, and other well-intentioned persons with whom I disagree, in my tone and words, even while I spare no effort and offer no quarter in challenging the logic of their arguments.

It seems a Thomistic or (C.S.) Lewisian approach, to me.

Joe,

You're giving humor a bad rap. Lighten up.

Look, you've had to disavow your religion in order to come to your conclusions that you can get behind Obama as a Catholic. The facts are, you can't.

All the misquoting of the Popes and opinions that the Compendium to opine that the Catholic Church things the cause of corruption and greed is free enterprise and Democracy and you are here to decode the subliminal messages from Rome that the sins of greed, envy and stealing is perish from society with socialism and marxism...well, suffice it to say the preponderances use the same protocol used to disavow the leadership of the Holy Spirit and the Vicar of Christ.

If you read a poll and conclude the truth is "whole world wants Obama", debunking how you came to your conclusions is not a personal attack upon you, Joe. It's righting the wrongs for those on a pursuit of truth - least they get tripped up into the big sucking sound.

Joe:

Having done my side-item on civil discourse, "we now resume with your regularly scheduled programming": Argument!

Kennedy? Sure: A proud equal-rights-but-anti-quotas tax-cutting pro-military anti-communist. Were he alive in the 80's instead of the 60's, he'd likely have run as/voted Republican. (Well...if he'd had amnesia on the subject of his familial connection to the Democrats, and only ran/voted on a policy basis.)

And Johnson? Though I think his domestic social record was atrocious and put the U.S. back 50 years, he also gave no quarter to communist dictators.

But neither of those men would be comfortable in the Democratic party of today: Witness Joe Lieberman, whose views are similar to theirs.

Now Carter? Carter?! How can you say "I don't recall...Carter...ever giving a supposedly left-wing dictator a free pass" without choking on either laughter or a levitating lunch? I can't think of a dictator or thug that man didn't cozy up to...not least in the years since he left office! There is such a thing as a man who's too sweet-natured and gullible to serve in elective office, and Carter is the textbook example: A "useful idiot" for the purposes all the nastiest regimes on the planet, promoted to his level of incompetence in accord with the Peter Principle.


You betcha. Just like atheist Saddam had meetings with theocratic Al Qaeda, and Shia Iran protects Sunni terrorists from Afghanistan, and Hezbollah trains in camps set up by half-Catholic, half-atheist Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. And FDR and Churchill sat down with Stalin at Yalta. And we for years supported a guy like the Shah to stave off a guy like Khomeini. And Arafat's Fatah, to stave off Yassin's Hamas. And with Christian-persecuting totalitarian China, to stave off North Korea. And so on, and so forth, et cetera, et alia, ad infinitum, ad nauseam.

It's a sad truth that co-ordination with one's ideological enemies in order to achieve the defeat one's other ideological enemies is a staple tactic of the evil and the good (and thus shalt always be, in a fallen world).

Even Reagan was diplomatic, when visiting the Kremlin.

The only question, then, is: How can one distinguish between someone who's cozy with nasty regimes out of sheer unwished-for necessity, and someone who's cozy with nasty regimes because of actual affinity or blindness to their nastiness?

Well, you look at context: Was the Dem or Rep in question forced to shake hands with a murderer by tough circumstances? Or did they do it purely optionally? Did their words express genuine warmth, or is it clear that they were politely withholding their real opinion for the sake of diplomacy?

This is plain common sense. Reagan was civil, not only with Gorbachev for whom there was some justification for civility, but Andropov, for whom there was none. But no-one questions his real feelings on the matter, do they?

The justifiable perception of the American people for forty years has been that Democrats who cozy up to dictators usually feel an affinity and/or are blind to their nastiness, whereas Republicans who cozy up to dictators would rather not, but do so out of necessity. And the proof in the pudding is that when the Republican in question is in a stronger position where he doesn't have any need to cozy up, he doesn't...and often uses blunt insulting language to describe the dictator in question. (I'm sure some examples spring to your mind.) The Democrat (I'm thinking of Carter again, here, but also Pelosi and, by his own expressed intent, Obama) is more likely -- absent any need to do so, notice! -- to dash off to meet with the scumbag in question, to lend a stamp of diplomatic approval to his stolen election or his protestations of peaceful intent toward Israel, and give the scumbag the benefit of a smiling photo-op.

RC says,

"My point, again, is: I will respect Joe, and other well-intentioned persons with whom I disagree, in my tone and words, even while I spare no effort and offer no quarter in challenging the logic of their arguments."

If only everyone could be this way :)

RC, you were curiously silent when I was having this whole discussion underneath one of Deal Hudson's articles. I thought I'd put this thing to bed, but hey, since its you...

Off the bat:

"His choice of friends is atrocious, his connections to the corrupt or criminal thick on the ground, his political history an embarrassment of inaction or bad action, his personal history full of questions and long silences."

McCain has atrocious "friends" too - Charles Keating and G. Gordon Liddy come to mind. Every politician and probably most people in general have atrocious friends. You wouldn't believe the people I used to associate with. I don't think it makes me an atrocious person.

As for the rest, I think there is a great deal of smear and distortion taking place. Obama has never refused to answer a question put directly to him; all you can do is assume he is lying. I see no reason not to believe what he has said on the several occasions he has answered these questions. I think the whole thing is just ridiculous - it reeks of desperation more than it resembles anything legitimate or worth five minutes of my time.

Now as for expectations - I think his history as a community organizer, as someone who has been involved with unemployed workers, with educational issues, is a PLUS. I don't view that sort of activity as "dangerous" or "too radical", and frankly I don't know how any Christian possibly could. He was simply doing good for people. That's a good thing. I like that. Plus for Obama.

But because he's the political opponent, there must be something hidden, something ulterior, something not-quite-right about it. Meanwhile all anyone on the Democratic side can do, at least until recently, is preface every commentary on McCain with praise for his military service.

The big question:

"I mean, if you really are worried he'll pass FOCA (as he's stated he will), or that he'll ensconce more anti-human-dignity justices (as he's stated he will), why not work assiduously for his defeat, on those grounds?"

Of course he'll pass FOCA - IF it gets to his desk, and I don't think it will. A president is not a dictator. Even with a Democratic majority I believe that it won't get passed, because it is extreme enough to end up costing individual congressmen their seats if they vote for it. It's just hot air, like it was with Clinton back in 1992. I have a more detailed answer on the other thread.

You'll have to be more specific about some of these other things.

"Why not vote for his defeat, even if it means voting for a pair as execrable (in your view) as McCain/Palin? "

Because I believe they will plunge the world into chaos and darkness :) Do you think I like this decision? I could be completely wrong about FOCA. If it does end up becoming law, that's on my head and I know it (but it isn't a guarantee!). But if McCain won and started a nuclear war with Russia, and my vote could have stopped it, that will be on my head too. That and I think the two of them are so arrogant and reactionary that they would do serious damage to this country and the world even without a nuclear war.

I think Obama is more likely to play it from the center as President, I really do. I think this "radicalism" is over-blown, over-hyped nonsense.

Joe:


No, it isn't. But the question isn't whether technology or language-use has changed. Economics is undergirded by human nature. Human nature hasn't changed since 1776, and neither has morality.

Sure, there are times when it's appropriate to be peaceable, and times when it's appropriate to kill. The moral law does not produce the same answer for all scenarios.

But the scenario does not differ enough between 1776, or 1789, or 1825, or 1875, or 1895, or 1905, and today, to say: "It was once immoral to use force to achieve these ends, but now it no longer is."

Indeed, your comparison works the other way: Were not people in the U.S. in poverty in far greater danger of death then than now? Did not people in fact sometimes starve? Was not medical care far harder to come by?

You're right, it's not 1776. If our forefathers could justly avoid the use of force at the Federal level to compel almsgiving, we, their coddled heirs with soft fingertips and feet and waistlines, who can't walk two miles without wheezing, who're born with the expectations of shoes that fit and clothes we can throw away instead of patching, and cheap fresh vegetables and meat thrice a day, and inexpensive vitamin pills instead of snake-oil and Tylenol with Codeine instead of a stick to bite on, have absolutely no excuse.


No, we don't: That's injustice.

The Civilization of Love is most missing not in our hands but our hearts. Which is worse: The economic distance between J.D. Rockefeller and the paper-boy who would greet each other with grave civility? Or the resentment and hatred expressed by the service-worker whipped into a furor by his local community organizer, and the man who lives with wife and two kids in a 3000 square foot McMansion in the northern suburbs, who's justly afraid even to enter the service-worker's inner-city neighborhood? The latter economic distance is actually smaller: But their mutual love and respect is the less.

This Civilization of Love will not come about by chopping the heads off all the highest stalks: That's merely an enshrining of envy and covetousness in government policy. As Screwtape says when he Proposes A Toast, no-one who bothers to say "I'm as good as you" ever really believes it. The Great Dane never says it to the Toy Poodle, or the Thoroughbred to the Donkey.

Equality when viewed from the perspective of "Equal Protection Under Law" is justice: We should all play by the same rules.

But enforced equality of outcome is a moral evil. It robs men of both the freedom to succeed and the freedom fail. It robs them of the opportunity to be grateful for the generosity of their fellow man. It incentivizes class resentment rather than reducing it. It gives politicians a reason to whip up class resentment rather than discouraging it. It gives every group with a grievance (which is to say, every group) reason to buy off politicians, to better defend themselves against all the other groups who might turn government policy against them. It robs men of the opportunity to love each other through giving. (Just look at Europe today: Private charity there, when compared to America, does not exist. It just doesn't occur to anyone. Even liberals in America give more to the poor than Europeans do.)

For when you ask me for a donation, and I give one, we are both thereby ennobled. When you come to me with a gun and take it, I know I have found my enemy. And I will work to keep that enemy at bay. No wonder Europeans are so much more class-conscious!

When you say, "We need to justly distribute wealth by using it to improve the society that we all sustain through our labor. That is how we ought to think of taxation" ...the thought which first occurs to me is: I can't think of any surer way to build the Civilization of Hate.

I won't be around the rest of the day to reply to you guys (try not to be too dissapointed, Craig). I'd love to pick this up later tonight, but, RC, aren't you going to say anything about my little analysis of the Catechism, the Compendium and wealth redistribution?

Just as I gotta go, RC drops this on me. Sigh.

Will get a full reply tonight.

Now, I do agree with one thing you said:

Absolutely! All the more reason not to vote for Obama.

Education first: We need vouchers, and now. We need education purchasing parents to think of themselves as consumers, trying to get the most bang for their buck.

A vote for Obama, then, is a step in the wrong direction, on the subject of education: How much more empowerment can the NEA have? And do we really want more Supreme Court justices who'll be more likely to overturn any law permitting use of vouchers in Catholic schools?

Health Services: Here the solution is HSA's, and once again, Obama's plans are a step in the wrong direction. One can make a libertarian argument for government assistance with medical needs (and I do): So we use government matching in the HSA's. Add on insurance for catastrophic needs, and removal of large-employer tax incentives to offer coverage, and the plan is complete.

But one can't make an economic argument for a non-market system: Such systems inevitably produce waste, poor quality, high prices, overbuying and hoarding, and graft. In short: Her Majesty's NHS. So the more power we give to Obama and his ideological allies in Congress, the more wrongheaded programs we'll have to untangle and dismantle in the end, when we finally begin to transition to a sane system.

Scientific Research: Here, I dunno. I don't see any McCain advantage over Obama. But I don't see any advantage to Obama over McCain except in one area: I think Obama's more likely to be permissive on fetal research, human cloning, and experiments with transhumanism. If I'm correct, then it's likely scientists will feel freer under Obama than McCain (certainly freer than they felt under G.W.Bush, whom they all seem to despise on that score). But it's not anything I'd hope for. "Science, like nature, must also be tamed, with a view towards its preservation. Given the same state of integrity, it will surely serve us well."

Alternative Energy: Here we need the market-driven approach most of all. How much might we have wasted if we had selected the wrong technology five years ago? Ten? First it clean diesel. (I remember the diesel car my father drove for awhile in the 70's.) Later it was solar electric cars. Ethanol. Hydrogen fuel cells. Hybrids. Flex-Fuel. Biodiesel. Newer, more efficient solar. The list goes on.

While funding for research is fine, even incentives for use are fine. Both candidates support both. But there is one thing I think that Obama in his vast hubris would do, which I think McCain would not: Boldly say "Well, this is the best technology, so we're now all going to standardize to THIS."

Selecting implementation is where no solitary human intellect is sufficient. We need, not a czar to say, "Thou Shalt All Do This," but a zillion minds trying different options, finding most of them impractical, and abandoning them without great cost to the country or the delays of bureaucratic inertia. When the market adopts a solution, it will catch on, and the alternatives will fail: VHS and Betamax redux. Obama, I say in all seriousness, is the type of fellow who'd have been persuaded by Betamax, and would have built a Federal program to incentivize the preservation of 8-track.

Didn't mean to catch you just as you were signing off. I just got home from the church, and wanted to put my two cents in.

Take your time. Have a Sabbath.

Dear R.C.

Thank you for taking the time to read my post and for responding in-depth. While I do not wish to detail my charitable giving in a public forum, I would like to respond to some of the other points you make.

1. I will confess that at one point in my life I was supported by public taxation. That would be the years I spent in the United States Marine Corps, and for your largess – I am grateful. Thank you.

2. I’m sorry that I even mentioned the pro-Obama sentiment in Ireland. It was an afterthought and not pertinent to the rest of my post. I am a life-long American Catholic, but I do have cousins in Ireland (including the priest with the Obama button – no, he didn’t get it from me) and am often interested in their “take” on American affairs. Still, your post is the first time I have ever seen the Republic of Ireland being grouped with “Iran, China, North Korea, and Venezuela.” Curious.

3. The main thrust of my post was that the end of abortion will necessitate an increase in expenditures allocated to non-military public concerns – whether those funds come from voluntary acts of charity or public taxation.

4. I, for one, am disgusted by the prospect that one cent of my tax money might be used to procure an abortion – but I would be willing to see my taxes increase if that is the price of ending this horror.

5. I chose to raise Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” because, quite frankly, there are many Americans who oppose abortion yet show a curious disinterest in programs design to assist those children who are born into difficult circumstances. You strike me as a person of deep commitment and charity, and so this would not be directed towards you. (If you have not read Swift, pick him up sometime – greatest satirist to ever put pen to paper.)

Although I give quite regularly to many charities, not least of all the Church, I despair that private voluntary charity will ever be enough to assist those among us who are less fortunate. Perhaps you could provide an example where private giving was able to satisfy the domestic needs of the poor – it would be worth considering.

In Peace,

NHCatholic

Thanks, NHCatholic, for a gracious reply; I shall endeavor to do likewise.

I thank you for your service in the Marine Corps. Your pay in that capacity was due recompense for service rendered.

But don't conflate that pay with being on the dole. When a poor man gets a handout, it is in recognition of his need, not of the value of services rendered. A Marine's pay is for services rendered. (So, even if I opposed all recognition of need by the public sector, the pay you received wouldn't be pertinent.)

Second, consider what I called the four core competencies of government. As a Marine, your service fell well within the core competencies of government, whereas income transfers usually do not.

The core competencies are not my arbitrary invention; they merely recognize the reality of what government is.

Government is unique among all organizations in society in this way: It is the sole organization to which We The People delegate our Human Right of Self-Defense by Means of Force.

Now that's a dangerous power to grant. Consider your Marine training on topics like illegal orders. And (I think I'm quoting the Marine Officer's Guide correctly here) isn't integrity the most desirable trait for a Marine Officer?

"Jarhead" jokes aside, why not just have a bunch of mindless musclebound doofuses on the payroll? Because it's a dangerous thing to give the only gun in the room to the wrong man! Hence the stress on integrity, legal orders, and duly-constituted authority.

Now when government says "pay your taxes," it adds an understood "or else," because "he who pays not" is locked up, and "he who escapes prison" is perhaps shot. All government action is backed by the threat of force, authorized by...us. We're the ones drawing the gun. So we have a moral obligation to be restrained about when we draw that gun. We must do our best to limit its use to times when it is unquestionably needed.

And that is where we get the core competencies of government. Things like police forces and armed forces (and a judiciary working with the former, and a civilian government controlling the latter) are intended to address criminals (who initiate force or fraud against the innocent) or enemy combatants (who initiate force against the innocent).

The Catholic Just War doctrine says that we must not pull out a gun and shoot someone for just any reason. We may not even pull it out merely in order to get some resource that they have, which we do not.

No, we respond with force to those who initiate force against us. (Is that not what all the Catholic opponents of the Iraq war argue we failed to do, which made the resumption of hostilities against Saddam Hussein unjustified?)

And that's the origin of the core competencies of government: They deal with the use of force, or its administration, against threats to innocent lives. We are justified in drawing weapons in such circumstances, not least because when it comes to criminals and enemy combatants, the other fellow started it.

...continued...

Now I do not say that the government ought never do anything outside its core competencies: But I do say that if it does so, then:

1. Its powers to do so should be properly constituted. (In the United States, at the Federal level, such redistributive powers are not constitutionally authorized, and would require an amendment to authorize them. Existing programs are an usurpation. There's really no historical counter-argument to this; those who argue that the Federal government does already possess this power do so under the "living document theory"...just as Protestants who say that the Apostles taught salvation through faith alone, and the purely symbolic nature of the Lord's Supper, are indulging in "living document" revisionism, amply debunked by historical sources.)

2. As the subject of the use of force drifts further and further away from areas of core competency (that is, from situations where the use of force is inescapable and initiated by another), government should be progressively gentler and more indirect in its application of force.

This is a recognition of disparity of force. When a rival nation comes at me with nuclear weapons, it's appropriate I have an arsenal of nukes and say, "Back off." When it comes at me with illegal immigrants, I use lightly-armed border patrol agents, not nukes. When a criminal holds a small revolver, the police bring out the shotguns or even the SWAT unit...but even if Posse Comitatus were no issue, they wouldn't bring in an armored division with Abrams tanks.

Thus does the government limit its use of force even when a "bad guy" initiates force, or the threat of it.

Now an entrepreneur working 60 hours and burning energy and creative talent can make a cool million in profit over a year, while his neighbor living ten miles away with identical protection under law and only slightly disparate opportunity, can have a radically different outcome, and barely pay his bills.

What has that entrepreneur done that justifies you pulling a gun on him, taking $100,000 from him, and giving it to the fellow who can barely pay his bills?

The answer is: Nothing. You aren't declaring war on him, nor charging him with a crime, or even bringing a civil action against him.

So government should either not use force, or use it as indirectly as possible, to alleviate this disparity.

So, public service announcements are better than tax deductions for charity. Tax deductions are better than tax credits. Tax credits are better than lightly progressive income taxes. Lightly progressive income taxes are better than heavily progressive ones. Heavily progressive income taxes are better than wealth taxes. Any tax is better if it doesn't produce handouts on the other side. If it does, better that they be small and applied as "matching" to other private sources of income, than large and/or of fixed sum. Better they be fixed sum, than inversely proportional to income.

Now that's a whole spectrum of government action. Metaphorically, it ranges from casually laying one's thumb near the break-strap of the holster, all the way to drawing the gun and pointing it.

Now, given the fact that the poor in the U.S. are virtually the middle class of the remainder of the world, is government action on the extreme end of that spectrum called for?

I don't think it is. Unless you mean the extremely light end. In which case: Knock yourself out encouraging charitable giving through Public Service Announcements. Now that's a Federal dollar well-spent.

Some other items:



And that was an atopical aside (making the point that some regimes favor Obama because they know he'll serve their national interests better than he'll serve ours) on my part; I'm sorry too.

For of course I don't mean to say that Europe -- of which I prefer the political temperament of people in the U.K. over that of all others save maybe the Poles and Romanians -- is to be grouped with the cavalcade of dictatorships in my list.

Still, the Europeans opted for a more socialist approach to governance, and got what one might expect: No charity to strangers, a secularized worldview in which the Church is an antiquated irrelevance, less respect for human dignity at the extremes of life than nearly anywhere outside the aforementioned dictatorships, and economic productivity (the least of these concerns, but worthy of mention) which looks at all times like the productivity of the U.S. in a recession. (I'd rather avoid that -- all of that -- here, please.)

Now misery loves company and everyone likes seeing their own assumptions confirmed. So how could Europe en masse favor anyone but Obama? But I see mostly discredit to Obama in the fact. (Tho' it saddens me somewhat to see Ireland swept up in the general European mania. I held out small hopes they'd swim against the EU cultural tide.)


I quite agree, with the proviso that I would sooner see us weigh as heavily as possible on voluntary charity, with government efforts serving merely to facilitate or organize. Following my earlier analogy, I don't mind if there are town permits and traffic cops involved at the fundraising rally, but I wish to avoid the immorality of having the cops actually point their weapons at the attendees and say, "give."


I certainly agree with you. How about: a 5% tax hike for all brackets, with a 3% drop for the first child adopted, a 2% drop for the second adopted, and a 1% for the third? (See, I can compromise, when the issue is urgent!)

I thank you for excluding me from these ranks...but to be honest, I don't see these ranks being particularly numerous to begin with, unless you assume that "he who does not support federal assistance, must therefore not support any government assistance," and furthermore, "he who does not support any government assistance, must not care at all."

I think both those assumptions are false: Church-going political conservatives in the U.S. are far-and-away the most statistically likely not only to tithe to their churches, but to give (and give most generously) of their time and money to charities outside their churches. And these are the very same persons who're most likely to oppose abortion.

So I think it highly probable that those who're opposing abortion are also in fact the ones doing the most to help disadvantaged children.

Are you sure you're not extrapolating from "have a moral and practical objection to Federal-level assistance" to "don't give a damn?" Or, perhaps you've had bad luck with the abortion-foes of your own personal acquaintance?

Re: Swift: He is, as you say, brilliant.

Ok RC, I'll start with this:

"Indeed, your comparison works the other way: Were not people in the U.S. in poverty in far greater danger of death then than now? Did not people in fact sometimes starve? Was not medical care far harder to come by?"

It doesn't really work, RC, and if you look at the point I made, it was simply that at the time of this country's founding, the wealth that the vast majority of families produced was concrete, used for immediate consumption. In other words most people were, in a genuine economic sense, self-sufficient. This is a technical issue and not really an ideological one. That was 230 years ago. Jefferson's agrarian Main-Street republic was 100 times larger than Hamilton's Wall-Street oligarchy.

Therefore what you taxed in 1776, or 1783, really was the direct product of the fruit of a person's labor in a way alien to most of us today. Today the wealth we create is largely a social abstraction, embodied in products and services that require the collective effort of thousands of individuals, sometimes on different continents, to produce. This again is a technical, and not an ideological issue. It's the way the cookie crumbled.

There are also degrees of self-sufficiency in any country, city, or community, but few can go the way of the Amish and totally opt out. To work in America is to contribute to its GDP; we are all a part of, as John Paul II wrote, one great workbench or workshop. Amish-like exceptions included, all wealth is a social product today in a way it wasn't 200 years ago.

The fortunes of the wealthy are a social product. Beyond salary and a reasonable stake in the companies they have created (reasonable given that their capital is useless without their workers in particular, and society in general), they shouldn't exist in private hands. Taxation is the least we can do to justly distribute the wealth of society; distributism is the only way to achieve a lasting change.

All it really means is that a sliver of the population can no longer live like mortal gods while their brothers and sisters starve. And I all I am adding to this is that in addition to being fair, it also happens to be just.

It is not robbery, it is a simple recognition of the equal dignity and objective weight and worth of labor in the productive process, and rendering to it what it is due - which is beyond the wage, beyond what market forces alone can or will provide, which the Catechism condemns as the sole criteria for determining justice or fairness. That is not utopia, that is not unjust, that is not asking too much.

You use phrases like "enforced equality of outcome" - I don't know a single person who is for that. At this point what we need is a more honest assessment of how wealth is created, how it is appropriated. That is why I am in general a distributist; because it heals the breach between work and wealth opened up by the Industrial Revolution.

I certainly believe this, RC: the more self-sufficient we become as individuals, families and communities, the less the government should take from us and the less it should do.

But it is wrong when the conservo-libertarian assumes that government arbitrarily decided to assume more powers for itself; all of society rather plodded along unconsciously from pre-industrial days down to the present, revolutionizing their way of life without revolutionizing their conscious understanding of the economic and social forces they unleashed. Government did not get us here, we all got ourselves here. Until we can make genuine strides at getting out from under it, we need government to provide us what we cannot provide for ourselves.

Short and sweet:

Healthcare - he is not for anything resembling NHS. I've yet to meet a person from a country with socialized medicine who has had anything but good things to say about it, so until I do some investigation of the empirical evidence for myself, I'm not going to say it would be preferable. All Obama wants is a quasi-national health insurance plan, which is a far, far cry from NHS but is, in my view, a step in the right direction. When he was asked "is healthcare a right or a privilege", he responded "a right". That's the direction we need to go.

Education - You may have a point, but I think Obama actually supports vouchers at least to some degree. He said he did during the last debate with McCain. In any case, vouchers aren't some sort of grand solution: education too must be a fundamental right in the 21st century, not only for fairness sake but because it is the foundation of the economy. That means we have to invest in and revitalize the public schools as well as give more free reign to the private. Not everyone can or will want to go to a private school but everyone needs some education.

Alt. Energy - Obama is talking about a 150 billion dollar investment in alternative energy. This is not wasteful or irresponsible spending, but again, vital to economic progress in the 21st century. I don't think he opposes a market approach, but we should all oppose the oil cartels attempts to slow or halt this process for their own benefit. Meanwhile McCain is talking about spending freezes, a dangerous and stupid proposal that he couldn't possibly enact and still move forward with "wind, solar, tide" and all the rest he likes to list in his stump speech.

Science - Here I can't argue with you, at least on the threats to life. The point was just that, in general, government needs to fund scientific research.

There's a lot to respond to in those last two posts of yours Joe, and I'm going to be short on time. Bear with me, it may be tomorrow afternoon before I've dealt with some of it.

On a quick overview, I see the following items I want to challenge or ask you to clarify:

1. Is it actually true that most wealth in the U.S. in 1789 was not a social product, but a matter of self-sufficiency? (We can exclude slave states, for starters: One can hardly claim self-sufficiency through slaveowning.) Wouldn't most U.S. wealth at that time still be a product of trade, whether in the community or via import/export? This is the colonial age we're discussing, not the stone age, and farmers have "gone into town" to buy feed and supplies and tools since they first planted the Nile delta, let alone Revolutionary-era America.

I don't know how one could numerically measure the "social product rating" of an economy. I guess you could say that, in the creation of Product X (whether good or service), it is not a "social product" unless its creation required the input of at least one other prerequisite Product Y, which, if acquired directly from Y's producer, involves one person's worth of "social producthood," and if acquired from Y's producer through an intermediary broker, involved at least two.

And if Product X involved more than one prerequisite Product Y, but in fact required Y1, Y2, Y3...Yn, each with its own producer and possibly broker, then its "social producthood" score increases quickly.

Now it seems to me that if you determined the "social producthood" score of every product made in the U.S. in 1808 -- or in Ancient Rome for that matter -- the percentage of them that had a "social producthood" score of zero would be very small indeed: A percentage not much lower than what you'd find conducting the same evaluation of U.S. GDP in 2008.

But I grant that the number of input products for each product would increase between 1808 and 2008. In 1808 you might have each Product X requiring Y1, Y2, and Y3, of which only Y3 requires prerequisites (presumably Z1, Z2...). Whereas in 2008 you might have the average Product X requiring fifteen input Y's, ten of which would require input Z's, and so on.

Is that what you mean by saying that GDP is now more of a social product? And if so, what of it? How is any man less entitled to the profit margin he makes off a series of trades, just because the items he trades were previously traded with other men?

2. There are certainly men -- there might be more than 100 of them! -- in the U.S. who "live like mortal gods"; but they represent the tiniest portion of those whose lifestyles are seriously reduced by highly progressive taxation. Once we've put Paris Hilton and her spiritual twin sisters in sackcloth, why sock it to all the others? And making twits like Paris the poster children for millionaires in the U.S. is a lot like making Paul Shanley the poster child for the Catholic priesthood. I think our sense of the number of such folk is exaggerated by their disproportionate media exposure. And how many of them are also great benefactors?

And as for those who starve...why is that? Do they just not know of the ten churches within walking distance? Of the soup kitchens and the food stamps and the subsistence-living programs, federal, state, and local? Because we have to accept that there are a good 1% of humanity who, no matter what you do, won't take the help you give 'em. Lead that horse to water a hundred times, but can you make them drink? If you've had in your family or among your friends a bright, normal, well-adjusted person who turned junkie, you'll know what I mean.

3. You say redistribution is "not robbery, it is a simple recognition of the equal dignity and objective weight and worth of labor in the productive process." Unless a system (you proffer Distributism, but without plans for transitioning to it) exists in which labor can be assigned more value at the level of the individual business, then it seems to me that this statement, even if I accepted it were true, would present an insurmountable problem.

For what you're trying to achieve is "cosmic justice." (Thomas Sowell's Knowledge and Decisions and The Vision of the Anointed were written with you in mind, Joe!) You hold the opinion that the worth of a laborer is more than the man who paid him thinks it was. (As a contract software developer who has to haggle with clients over what my work's worth I'm open to that idea!) So you take on yourself -- or some government cipher who's no wiser than yourself -- to assign additional value to each such hour of work. I contend that no man has the wisdom to assign that value so well as the market already does. I add that equal protection under law and a partial, but intentionally not total, leveling of equal opportunity, combined with market pricing and strongly-encouraged private almsgiving, are far-and-away a superior tool. For there, in each case, those affected by the decisions are those who make them.

4. You say:Until I see that assessment demonstrate otherwise, my experience is that wealth is created through decisions. (And I don't know how one could assess the value of anything in a way that its market price would not more convincingly rebut.)

How odd! You, then, intentionally support a system designed to discourage trade with those outside our neighborhood and bloodline and household. What better way to reduce community? Soon you'll be the champion of the rugged individualists. For we always get less of what we tax more.

5. The grass is always greener on the other side, but speaking soberly, we've got it not only good, but great. I'm glad "we got ourselves here." I don't feel a particular urgency to "get out from under it." And that's speaking as a self-employed middle-class guy with two kids, non-working-wife, third kid on the way next year. If I could change anything, I'd make health care more affordable (HSA's), education vouchered, and have parish priests preach as much about tithing and charitable giving as Baptist preachers do. But I wouldn't do anything that would systemically alter the whole economy. My turns in ministry to the poor make me think they need good times far more than the wealthy do.

How about this?

I could stomach increased taxes intended for the sake of redistribution to the poor more easily if there were an optional component to it. But how can taxes be made optional?

One way is the Fair Tax: Combine a consumption-of-new-items tax with a monthly prebate on the amount of tax each household would pay on all their spending up to the poverty level cost-of-living. (Result: no one pays the tax until they're buying above-and-beyond poverty-level spending.) In that system, tax is "optional": You buy like a poor man, and you pay no taxes. (Better incentive for personal savings and charity, too. Today, both of those are post-income-tax; under Fair Tax, they're untaxed.)

Another way is: Add another X% to everyone's taxes. (I'll tell you how to calculate X in a moment.) Then make charitable giving a tax credit for up to X% of your income. (Anything after that is a tax deduction like it is now.)

X is calculated as 1/10th your income percentile. If you make more money than 99% of the population, X is 9.9%. If you make more money than only 10% of the population, X is 1%.

So: Low income earners are scarcely affected. High income earners basically tithe, or else they pay it in taxes: Their choice.

All this is to reiterate what I said before: We should use government force ideally only when force is initiated by some evildoer. But since we don't live in an ideal world, we can make allowances and use force a bit more broadly. Still, we recognize that an entrepreneur who makes a million bucks one year is not an evildoer for doing so, and blunt force against him is unjustified. Therefore, we try to make that use of force as light and indirect and even optional as possible.

This also has the salutary effect of not putting decisions in the hands of government which they lack the knowledge to make, and which would make them a target of bribery and political fighting. For our politics are most civil and least corrupt when our fortunes aren't at stake in government's decisions. When governments have centralized control over how income flows, the profitability of the business-savvy gets replaced with the profitability of those who're best at political infighting and bribery. We replace a meritocracy with a kleptocracy: We give up the aristocracy of ability and get the aristocracy of pull.

That's worth avoiding.

To start with your specific items:

"Is it actually true that most wealth in the U.S. in 1789 was not a social product, but a matter of self-sufficiency? (We can exclude slave states, for starters: One can hardly claim self-sufficiency through slaveowning.)"

I don't know, RC, but that isn't the claim I made. The claim I made was that the wealth that most families produced was for themselves, through farming. The vast majority of Americans in colonial America were either farmers in the country or craftsmen in the towns and cities who could sustain themselves largely through their own efforts.

Regarding the slave states, only a small percentage of Southerners actually owned slaves, just as only a small percentage of Northerners were commercial or industrial capitalists. Most white Americans in the South were farmers and craftsmen too, who did not own slaves, so I don't think you can just "exclude the slave states".

The context of the point is this; when you produce mostly for your immediate consumption, instead of producing directly for sale on the market, I consider that economically self-sufficient. And when you are self-sufficient, taxation does become more onerous and more unjust.

Your comments about ancient Egypt nonwithstanding, obviously there is a spectrum between total self-sufficiency on the one hand, and total dependence on the other. Of course no was really 100% self-contained, of course practically everyone produced a surplus and engaged in trade. Wealth has always been social to some degree or another. There's no need for you to stretch my point to a place that you know I wouldn't take it. It suffices to say that the colonial farmer or craftsman was several times more self-sufficient than the wage worker of modern America, due to the overwhelming changes introduced by the Industrial Revolution.

"I don't know how one could numerically measure the "social product rating" of an economy."

RC, I'm trying to paint a broad historical picture here, to contrast the realities facing producers in two different historical epochs. One could, if one were so inclined, probably do the quantitative analysis of historical economies and figure it out; they would most obviously find that again, the great and rapid increase comes at the time of the Industrial Revolution. It isn't really necessary if we can simply agree that this revolution changed the fundamental make-up of the economy and continues to do so to this day.

I'll answer the relevant question:

"How is any man less entitled to the profit margin he makes off a series of trades, just because the items he trades were previously traded with other men?"

I never mentioned anything about "trades", and for good reason; trade does not create wealth, labor does. Whatever you trade, at least as a producer (lets please exclude the cases where you have a garage sale and "trade" your old junk), you are trading the products of labor. Economic exchange is essentially an exchange of equivalents. Profit is made possible by the simple fact that what a person is worth on the labor market (their wage) is never the equivalent of what he will produce on the job (a definite share of the profit). The creation of wealth takes place outside of the market. Wealth is produced, not magically produced when two people hand each other things.

On the wealthy:

I didn’t really mean Paris Hilton. I was talking about the Forbes 400, worth over 1.6 trillion, including a lot of the CEOs on Wall Street that trashed the economy and got rewarded ridiculously for their “work”.

On the poor:

First of all, I’m not exclusively talking about the American homeless population, many of whom are mentally ill. I’m talking about the entire world. I don’t want to get into a treatise now on global injustices, but one thing that has impressed me is that the Church, time and time again, has spoken plainly and clearly on these injustices, on the moral imperative of wealthy countries to aid in the development of impoverished countries.

The broader point is this: it is absolutely ridiculous for anyone to have a billion dollars. One level it represents a massive injustice - no one’s efforts are worth that much. On another level it is immoral - no one needs that much wealth to survive, live comfortably, or even luxuriously. At that level of wealth it is wealth for its own sake, for the power and glory it brings. I don’t care if you have a trillion dollars and you give 99% away; if you still have a billion you still have more than your work could ever entitle you to and more than it would take a thousand laborers a thousand lifetimes to earn.

On labor and its worth:

“For what you're trying to achieve is "cosmic justice." (Thomas Sowell's Knowledge and Decisions and The Vision of the Anointed were written with you in mind, Joe!) You hold the opinion that the worth of a laborer is more than the man who paid him thinks it was.”

Cosmic justice? That’s cute. Please don’t confuse me with liberals who simply want to pump up the minimum wage, or trade-unionists who think collective bargaining is the only way the workers can prosper. I oppose the entire idea that a human being should ever have their existence depend upon their monetary value in the marketplace. The Church agrees, if you’ll read the paragraphs from both the Catechism and the Compendium that I posted here earlier. For it is one thing to say that the market can ultimately determine the price of an object; a human being, a being with inherent dignity and moral worth, is a different story altogether.

Our wealth should be tied to what we do as producers, not what impersonal market forces say we are worth as laborers. That means, at the very least, a definite share in profits, to be determined democratically by the people who actually do the work. When Pope Leo XIII wrote Rerum Novarum he drew the connection between labor and just entitlement to property. We are no less entitled to what we produce in the factory than what we produce in the field. The difference is that, going back to that old historical example, what we produced in the field as yeoman farmers or in the shop as town craftsmen was ours because the field was ours or the tools were ours; what we produce in the factory of the office is someone else’s because some one else owns it. The only way to link our wealth to our work is to spread ownership, and that is why I am a distributist. I have no problem with the market determining the price of commodities, as long as, as Pope Pius XI said, “labor is not a commodity.”

Next:

“Until I see that assessment demonstrate otherwise, my experience is that wealth is created through decisions. (And I don't know how one could assess the value of anything in a way that its market price would not more convincingly rebut.)”

I know you are big on seeing the empirical data, and that is good. I admire that quality and I wish more people had it.

But shouldn’t it then especially strike you as odd to say that a decision - a mental process - creates wealth, a physical thing? You can sit around and decide all day; someone still has to do something.

Even if there are other sources of wealth than labor, it is indisputable that labor is a source of wealth. Before the market can price anything, before any quantity of wealth at all can exist, labor must be undertaken. I don’t need a quantitative analysis of the production process to simply establish that fact. Frankly such things bore me as secondary details to be worked out at a later time. Fundamental agreement on the premises should be enough.

As for this:

“How odd! You, then, intentionally support a system designed to discourage trade with those outside our neighborhood and bloodline and household. What better way to reduce community? Soon you'll be the champion of the rugged individualists. For we always get less of what we tax more.”

I do? Huh? You lost me there. I don’t “support” that - I was simply pointing out that it was the reality for thousands of years before the Industrial Revolution. Today’s distributism must be based upon modern industry; that means workplaces owned by the workers through shares, run by them through the democratic process. And that means everyone from the ground floor to the executive office, though the latter are simply going to have to make a lot less, their shares, a lot smaller, as an accurate reflection of their actual contribution.

Marketing is now a standardized, scientific process; groups of educated workers can make the same decisions and consult the same experts. There are no irreplaceable elements in the modern firm which can hold it and society hostage, and demand ridiculous compensation lest they walk away. The gracious thing to do would be for them buy themselves out and go retire; we can get on well enough without them. The success of the modern cooperative is already proof enough of that.

Kate:
I realize I’m a bit late to the debate, but this is fantastic article, and very well written.

As for the debate over how much money is too much, that misses the point. I’d rather live in a society where there is no limit placed on one’s earnings than a society where we hand that responsibility off to the government. As Kate so beautifully pointed out in her article, socialism doesn’t work, and I’d prefer to not see the United States have to learn a lesson that’s already been learned elsewhere.

Just because one is ‘ridiculously’ wealthy in someone else’s eyes doesn’t give the latter person the right to place constraints on the former’s wealth. Tom Monaghan could be considered ridiculously wealthy, but he’s also used that wealth to promote his Catholic faith in ways that members of the middle class (like me) cannot, and God bless him for his work.

The Bible teaches us that to those of whom more is given, more will be expected. God will be our judge as to how we’ve used our talents. I’d prefer not to see the government step into that role.

I read all this with great interest. It occurs to me that while we all talk about how it isn't Catholic to hoard money and accumulate too much wealth, people don't often mention covetousness. Desiring what another has is also un-Catholic. My point is a simple one - at the core of our consumeristic/materialistic culture, the 10th commandment seems to lie dormant. I wouldn't want to be a millionaire for all the tea in China.

Economic theory, science, and history all prove that taxes are too high when tax revenues to government fall with a tax increase.
Bush's tax cuts, alledgedly that favored the rich, produced unprecedented revenues to the government. It was the same under Ronald Reagan's tax cuts.
The above historical facts are irrefutable. Study it; its true.

The Obama rhetoric of class warfare is terribly destructive to the USA.

But Teri, don't you know it's not about what actually increases revenue?

It's about how unfair it is that some people earn -- or even, to acknowledge the effects of dumb luck -- get more than others!

Don't you know that we, for the sake of our own self-esteem if no other reason, must impose egalitarian justice on everything within our sphere of influence? Must perfect man kind, must build heaven, must equalize all outcomes? How could we sully such a glowing and noble vision with discussion of revenue?

Why should a man worry about whether his authority is justly constituted (how pedantic!) or whether the Internal Revenue Service is doing anything for revenues (how dully literal!) when injustice roams freely on the streets in the form of people who're performing better than others?

Who, after all, needs a nation of laws? We can have a nation ruled by the judgment of a few men, whom we'll elect because we're convinced of their good will and noble intentions, and empower to be benevolent dictators, righting every wrong and deciding what constitutes fairness for us all!

(Provided the men in question are of a particular worldview and academic clique, of course: We wouldn't want unenlightened types disturbing our deliberations.)

Hence the need for an anointed one: And lo and behold: He comes as if responding to an unknown summons, springing from a distant murky Pacific Rim origin like one rising from the sea itself. (We'll have to wait and see if his horns have crowns, and if his forty-eight month term will somehow only last forty-two.)

To this man we will give all the authority he needs to right every wrong, to lift up the little people, to make us all one. (Except for those who disagree: They'll get theirs[/], and make no mistake. But the sooner we're rid of them, the better, and anyway y'can't make an omelette, et cetera.)

And thus shall we equate what makes us happy with what is fair, what is fair with what is just, what is just with what is legal, and what is legal with...whatever makes us happy!

Trust us.

I let myself get carried away in the heat of composition, and failed to close my italics correctly after the word theirs. Sorry.

Did I say "dictators?" Sorry, slip of the pen: I meant "lightworkers," of course.

Joe:

Just one quick reply to the last of your posts: I'm surprised you didn't take the point.

You stated:

Perhaps you didn't mean it quite as you said it? (I mean, the quote contained the word "should," suggesting you saw either a practical or moral imperative in the rule. But when I exhibited the implications of following that rule, you said, "Huh? You lost me there. I don’t “support” that....")

At any rate, the reality of human nature is thus: Government policy influences behavior around the margins, but never amounts to total control.

Obama's Great Society-like visions will influence human behavior in mostly bad ways. The layoffs that've already begun in anticipation of his victory are just one aspect. But there will still be people willing to start businesses and even hire others, even under Obama.

Similarly, a society along the lines I'd prefer, in which the unconstitutional entitlement programs, which we sadly can't be rid of, were held at a constitutional ceiling of 50% of the previous year's revenue to reduce the chances of our bankrupting ourselves by the overly-generous promises of years gone by, would have mostly beneficial impact on human behavior.

If I had my 'druthers, I'd even take it a step farther and phase money spent on entitlements partially into government matching on charitable giving, with the percentage of your gift that's matched being proportional to the percentage of your income you give.

That'd be salutary in many ways. It incentivizes generous giving, for a start. Moreover, it could serve as a substitute for the way leftist organizations currently receive Federal money right out of the budget. Wouldn't it be better if Planned Parenthood, instead of receiving a gift from the government annually, could only get Federal money if leftists would first donate a sizable amount of their own money?

To sum up, I see your vision and mine as having different methodologies, different views of history, different ratings of the goodness or badness of present circumstances, and different assumptions about the limits of human wisdom.

I assume that human wisdom is deeply fallible, even with good intentions. So I would never seek to increase central power over the economy: No man can be trusted with what a million men can. You trust Obama and the Democrats with far more power than I'd ever trust Republicans.

And I think the wisdom of where we are now deserves respect: We got to it through many hardships, and modifications should be very slow and evolutionary. I also think I'd rather live in the U.S. in recession than anywhere else on earth in moderately good times...the exceptions being the places most like the U.S. (I hope that'll still be true in four years.)

I see Obama's policies as a rehashing of 19th-century economic theory, the erroneousness of which is written in red ink across the 20th century. Far from being progressive, I'm appalled at how retrograde he is: He doesn't even seem to come up with new mantras or catch-phrases for what he wants to do, and only those who're too young to remember aren't wearied of it already.

And my methodology is: Incentivize human behavior to produce outcomes. They won't all fall in line, but most will, and you'll have spent less energy and money. Try to exert outcomes by your own decisions instead of theirs, and you'll spend more money, get less benefit, and have a whole lot of unexpected side-effects, too.

RC,

Regarding your confusion over my language:

That's a false dichotomy you drew, not any inconsistency on my part. I believe we can be more self-sufficient within a cooperative context. It is a concept as old as Aristotle, even older; private property, public, common or collective use and benefit. You have a share that is yours, but it is useless unless it is used in concert with everyone else.

Regarding layoffs:

It is ridiculous that our economy has to be held hostage in this way. Why have layoffs begun? Because Obama's tax policies might cut into future profits? Why does that have to mean job loss? Why can't it instead mean a pay cut for the already ridiculously over-compensated? Supply-siders always act as if jobs are the only expense that could ever be cut. That is a propaganda fantasy.

This is why I am a distributist. It is ridiculous that such a small percentage of the population should have so much control over so much wealth that their decisions can impact and potentially ruin the livelihoods of thousands of workers. This would not be an issue in a cooperative economy.

On Charity:

It simply cannot meet the vast, complex needs of modern society on its own - and even the Church recognizes this, and has proclaimed so time and time again. It takes a coordinated and rational effort, and there is NOTHING unjust about those efforts being funded by, and beneficial to, the vast majority of the population who create that wealth through their labor.

"To sum up, I see your vision and mine as having different methodologies, different views of history, different ratings of the goodness or badness of present circumstances, and different assumptions about the limits of human wisdom."

That is the one thing here I think we can both agree on. But I disagree that Obama is going to vastly increase the power of the government over the economy. He is not talking about price controls and planning commissions. He is talking about repealing the Bush tax cuts that McCain himself initially opposed, and investing in education and alternative energy, providing public works jobs, and the possibility of a stimulus package which is desperately needed.

That is not radicalism, and it certainly is nothing even close to a command economy. It doesn't even add up to European-style social democracy. It is a testament to how far to the right the conservative movement in this country is that such modest proposals could be mistaken for socialism. Only in America.

"And my methodology is: Incentivize human behavior to produce outcomes. "

I think Alan Greenspan just testified to Congress that this philosophy failed him and the entire country. It failed not because incentives don't work, but because they are unevenly distributed and poorly targeted. We should give people incentives to cooperate with one another and take an active interest in public affairs, not provide incentives to simply accumulate wealth and consume as if it were a religion.

Joe:

"It is ridiculous that our economy has to be held hostage like this."

Joe, nobody's holding it hostage. Distributism wouldn't change much about that...or if it would, it's because under Distributism organizations would be less good at reacting to change, and thus more likely to fail catastrophically. (I thought that was what you didn't want.)

They are just reacting in the most rational way they can to changing circumstances. Don't treat it as someone making a decision with evil motives; it isn't. It's everyone adjusting their behavior at the margins as seems best at the time: It's as immoral and unchangeable as the law of gravity.

Proponents of the constrained vision understand that individuals gauging their best course in response to government policy do not necessarily react in a way that neatly falls into line with the desires of those who instituted that policy.

Proponents of the constrained vision prepare for war because men always go to war and talk never stops it. They do not take the unrealistic view that it's only because the right person or the right combination of words and gestures hasn't been tried.

Proponents of the constrained vision know that no man on earth is wise enough to understand what "the public good" is to be trusted with enacting it through top-down methods; but that a system which encourages the price system to transmit estimations of the public's collective value of goods and services with minimal distortion will create a reasonably good, though imperfect, approximation of the public good using bottom-up methods.

The difference, then, between the Obama approach and the Milton Friedman approach (I can't say McCain because he doesn't have much philosophical clue what his approach is, and tilts 5% off-center to the Friedman side only from personal inertia and gut instinct) is much the same as the difference between the French Revolution and the American one.

The French, instead of looking at their social problems and asking "why?", looked at a thousand modern and enlightened possibilities and asked, "why not?" They pursued a form of government in which the people elected a person unconstrained by law, under the theory that if they got the right man in there, he could do much good. The result of course was tyranny and social upheaval and murders and riots and the tearing down of much that was noble and stable, and ultimately, a largely atheist former imperial power, like a 70-year-old former beauty queen still trying to dine out on her looks, with an economy rather less than that of my home state of Georgia, where Communists still pull decent numbers in national elections decades after Communism became obviously laughable.

The Americans realized that certain things in the past had worked, and certain things hadn't, and they limited government power to a humble role, and made it difficult (until the dishonesty of the "living document" notion became popular) to pry American law away from that constrained vision. Powers were set against other powers, and all limited by law, and property and trade rights guaranteed. Only the evil of slavery prevented the vision from being presented in the Declaration in an unadulterated fashion: "Among these rights are life, liberty, and property."

None of these men were unfamiliar with the notion of the common good and property's role in it: But they knew that government, having already been trusted with a monopoly on the use of force to achieve its aims, absolutely cannot be trusted with unfettered economic power (that is, power over how most men spend the vast majority of their waking hours) as well.

He who votes for Obamanomics, and Obama jurisprudence, and the philosophy underlying them, should make his expression of the unconstrained vision complete, and advocate also an abolition of the separation of powers, and of the role of the states in Federalism. It is myopia to not see them all as expressions of the same unconstrained vision.

Re: Greenspan: Alan Greenspan testified that incentives failed precisely because the wrong incentives were in play. Since Obama would make them worse, I can't see him as a solution.

...is that I'd vote for Obama's economics if he, and all those involved, had the wisdom and knowledge of the angels.

I'd even allow them to have the morality of men; if only they could know what the impact of their decisions would be.

But Obama and those he'd set to make court decisions, and to grant handouts, are, sadly, men.

I doubt they'll intentionally impoverish the country, including the poor.

I just think they don't know any better.

It's especially symptomatic of his lack of executive experience or even substantive legislative experience that he says things like, "I will change the world" and "I will unite us" and "I will help the Muslim world to see us not as an enemy, but an ally working toward a common goal" and such.

Only a person who's never had the humbling experience of making decisions -- of having to lay off someone because there just wasn't any way around it -- would have such hubris: Such a megalomaniac confidence in the effectiveness of his own rhetoric and good intentions.

A man who'd made decisions would have encountered the reality of his own powerlessness to make such big changes overnight.

It's the one lesson poor old George W. Bush sadly hadn't learned when he entered office. Bet he knows it now.

I wonder if W. listens to Obama's promises with mere sadness, or with dark humorless mirth. "Better you than me, pal."

RC,

I knew this would happen eventually. The moral rationale against your understanding of "Obamanomics" (which I contest is wrong, more on that later) has shifted ground.

As you have consistently argued until this point, me, Obama, and everyone who thinks in roughly the same way is supporting an unjust system of coercion. It is wrong, you and others have said, for the government to redistribute wealth, to forcibly take wealth from a rich man so that it can go to benefit a poor man. Now you say this:

"...is that I'd vote for Obama's economics if he, and all those involved, had the wisdom and knowledge of the angels."

Putting aside the point that I don't believe that a) Obama's plans call for knowledge on that scale to be able to work, or b) that even plans more detailed and far-reaching than Obama's would require such knowledge or wisdom; you are arguing that if the result or the consequences are good, as they presumably would be with such wisdom and knowledge, the means are justifiable.

So if I have a good reason to believe that you are vastly overstating both the aims of the economic policies as well as the knowledge needed for them to function, my position is morally sound. Because that's what you've effectively brought this down to: whether or not it will work. Justice is now determined by utility and consequence.

All this time I have been trying make a rather simple point:

that wealth is created by labor (whether or not other factors also actually create wealth, instead of simply move it around, is something we can debate),

that labor is what gives a person a just claim to property (among other things),

that in a modern society that just claim comes in the form of share ownership and at least a vote in company affairs (because wages are not the wealth we create but the cost of purchasing labor, which are two separate things),

that until we reach this desired point, taxation is a just distribution of wealth insofar as it does benefit the producers of wealth, who have a just claim to at least a portion of it, if not all of it, it through their labor.

Maybe it hasn't been as clear up until now, and one of the reasons I value discussions such as these is that it gives me an opportunity to sharpen arguments. So I'd like to know which of these premises you challenge, and why you challenge it.

I'd also stipulate that whether or not my basic proposition works or is separate from whether or not it is inherently just. If it has no chance of working, I wouldn't seek to impose it on society merely for the sake of principle.

Finally, I don't know what specifically you think Obama proposes to do that requires the wisdom of angels to work. Obama is not a socialist. He is not even a Social Democrat. He isn't even a Canadian. He is talking about a 3% increase in the top marginal rate, a possible capital gains tax increase somewhere down the line, and investments in education and alternative energy. He has consistently spoken of "bottom-up" approaches to economics, suggesting to me that his intention is to, as far as possible, give us the economic tools we need to reach some level of prosperity as individuals, families and communities.

Is there some reason to believe that when he says "bottom-up" he really means "top-down", that when he says markets are important but can't provide everything (which is what the Church also says) that he means planned production and price controls? What is it you think he wants to do that requires the wisdom of angels? What reason do you have to suspect that he is lying about his entire economic philosophy?

I just want to add one point to the argument -- not sure if this has been pointed out before.

Too high a taxation rate could be immoral, but how immoral is it? It's just money, after all. We live in a money obsessed society. Everything is money, money, money, as if God were a banker. Does anyone here really think God cares if the top marginal tax rate is 33% or 35%?

It is clear to me that what matters more than the specific tax rate are two things: (1) does the tax rate cause real, or just perceived, suffering; and (2) if the taxes are well spent, doesn't that matter also?

We can have a pitched battle over whether taxes are well spent. The true answer is, some are, some aren't. I work in the health field, and I can attest from experience that most tax dollars applied to health are well spent. I personally know many people who would be suffering horribly if they did not have tax supported health care.

But for me, the larger issue is that paying a little more here or there isn't going to kill me. There are more important things in life than money. We spend a whole lot of time fighting over taxes and precious little over things that really matter, like quality education and the plight of the poor.

Money is important, but it should not be the beginning and the end. Yet, to read articles like this, one would think it is more sinful to support a new tax than to miss Mass on Sunday.

Joe:

You justly point out an inconsistency in what I said.

When I said, "...is that I'd vote for Obama's economics if he, and all those involved, had the wisdom and knowledge of the angels," I was in moral error.

The only way that statement could be correct is to alter it as follows: "...is that I'd vote for Obama's economics if he were God, and all those involved were deputized by God, granted the wisdom and knowledge of angels."

Thank you for calling me to account on that inconsistency so quickly. Mea culpa.

Joe:

Regarding where wealth comes from:

You say, "that wealth is created by labor (whether or not other factors also actually create wealth, instead of simply move it around, is something we can debate)...that labor is what gives a person a just claim to property...."

As far as I can see, there is not anything incorrect in saying that either labor, or free exchange of the fruits of labor, or receipt of a gift, give a person a just claim to that piece of craftwork, or that purchased item, or that gift, as property.

I think that craftwork, for want of a better word, is created by labor. But that craftwork does not represent wealth unless someone values the work. I could spend every second of my life from the moment I know how until my last breath making "pet rocks" (presumably some generous sort gave me the glue and the googly eyes, and I'm collecting smooth stones from a creek bed I inherited). But the resulting collection of pet rocks is not wealth to me unless I want it, and is not wealth to anyone else unless they want it.

And in redistributive schemes, and even in tithing and sacrifices, measurement is accomplished by a measuring of the relative desire of human beings for an item. We must give our best to God; oddly, He allows His Law to recognize human systems of value in selecting what is "best": He presumably does not love the three-legged lamb less than the four-legged one, having made both. He asks 10% of our pre-tax income for our church, and more besides for the needy in other ways: And yet the 10% is measured in units having no meaning except as tiny slivers of "the full faith and credit of the United States government" -- slivers whose proportion of the whole "full faith and credit" shrinks as the money supply is expanded, and grows as it is contracted -- whose sole purpose is to express an opinion about the precise value of something, thereby simplifying bartering.

So: Labor, or voluntary exchange, or voluntary receipt deal with property, but desire must be calculated before the term "wealth" is introduced, or so it seems to me. Twenty thousand tons of 24 karat gold has absolutely no intrinsic value, and if the color of light it reflected were a shade unpleasing to human eyesight, I doubt the Ark of the Covenant would have been overlaid with it inside and out, or that heaven's streets would be described as being paved with it.

Which is also to say: A man can work on something all day, and not thereby produce the slightest increase in his wealth.

Michael:

I appreciate what you say, but I have to take issue with part of it: "I work in the health field, and I can attest from experience that most tax dollars applied to health are well spent."

Let us say that your experience is typical and accurate and broad enough to be statistically significant. (A reasonable assumption; you probably wouldn't have said it if you were only basing it on two or three occurrences.)

Even so, you could not possibly say, with real knowledge, that "most tax dollars applied to health are well spent."

The reason is because dollars placed at our disposal are always spent, and from the point-of-view of the person making the spending decision, they're well-spent; but whether they are "well" spent in an objective sense is a question about whether they're spent better than they otherwise would have been: And you're in no position to know that.

And, speaking more broadly, "Bad money drives out good" is consistently true when applied to charity. The New Deal reduced church-operated charity in the United States by some estimated 30%; the Welfare System in Europe destroyed their culture of private charity so entirely that in Europe people give an average percentage of their income to charities which is less than 1/5th that in the United States.

So, to know that a given tax dollar is well-spent, one would have to know both what that dollar would have been used for otherwise, how much additional overhead was caused by its progress through the government (it might have been $1.01 to be used otherwise, or it might have been $3.00 to be used otherwise), and one must further deduct from the value of that dollar the amount of private charity that was chased out of the market by the existence of that dollar.

You'd also need to account for the changes in the market. If 95% of those who don't have health insurance in the U.S. could afford it, but choose instead to spend on bar-hopping or clothes or pimping their ride (and 95% is too high, but plenty of studies show it's an easy majority) then you'd have to ask whether the absence of the tax dollar would have changed behavior in purchase decisions.

I leave that objection until last because those who don't have health insurance in the United States are predominantly young and fit and prone to think they'll live forever: One doesn't think these folks will change their ways just because a government program they've never thought about went away! These folks would just be caught without a net when they wrecked their rice-rocket. But if it went away for fifty years, you'd see a cultural change, which is a different matter from short term alterations in behavior.

Finally, there's a matter of whether the dollar, or three, matters more or less to the individual forced to give it up. Well, over years, that may be the difference between my having a Lambroghini, or a Mustang. Or it may be the difference between just giving to my local church, or funding a charitable foundation to educate the poor. Or between my daughters attending a private Christian college, or an in-state public one. One can't know, really, except to say: It is a matter of how many heartbeats I spent earning that dollar.

I have a finite amount of heartbeats. As one of "We The People," the Constitution represents an employment contract with my servants (the government) to provide protection and infrastructure and standards. I'm willing to give up many heartbeats for these things. But I already have done the work of estimating how many heartbeats, beyond my required tithe, I dedicate to the poor and needy. I haven't contracted or authorized my servants to override my decision on that point. I resent it, then, when they ignore their contractual restrictions in this matter. The poor I care about; uppity and presumptuous hirelings, not so much!

So, when you look at that dollar (and I'm glad it's not badly spent) consider whether you can accurately weigh its value against the heartbeats it represented to the original laborer. Maybe you feel you can, but I can't give my own wisdom so much credit.

Joe:

I do believe Obama is at heart a Socialist, and that his statements to which you refer represent him "running to the center in the general" and an acknowledgment that, in the U.S., he can only obtain power to implement Socialist goals by a gradual method.

I think this is reflected in his expressed disappointment that Constitutional jurisprudence had not yet moved sufficiently in the "living document" direction to allow stronger social justice legislation.

I think this is reflected in his choice of friends. (Bill Ayers' 2006 speech to the "World Education Forum" gathering of socialist revolutionaries in Caracas is particularly frightening; it scares me to think of a man having Presidential power who wouldn't strongly denounce a man who gave that speech, who, in 2006, was still calling Marxists and leftist dictators "comrades.")

I think this is reflected in his unguarded statements, e.g., to "Joe the Plumber." And the stupid/alarming "Department of Peace/Civilian Auxiliary" nonsense, ye gods! (Hitler Youth associations spring inescapably to mind.)

I think this is reflected by his voting record: What there is of it is closer to Bernie Sanders than, say, Sam Nunn or even (!) Joe Biden.

I think this is reflected in in his academic naïvité about his ability to effect change, and especially, to effect the changes he intends to effect. One can't necessarily conclude, "Talks like Academic, therefore Is Academic; Is Academic, therefore Is Socialist," but I can't help but feel pretty confident that he's quacking like a duck because he's a duck. And in the modern world, I can think of few professional backgrounds I'd trust less with political power than "Community Organizer, ACORN attorney, University Professor, Chicago Politician" because they lend themselves to the formation of that Academic mindset, without much leavening from the real world. (Give me someone who'd had to hire and fire and employ 100 normal people in a competitive business, any day.)

So, yeah. I think he's to the left of Hillary Clinton, and Pelosi and Reid and Feingold and Hastings, and fits in that niche with Sanders and Kucinich.

I basically feel I'm considering the whole picture, albeit with a gimlet eye, when evaluating Obama. I think that you're giving him rather too much benefit of the doubt, especially as regards FOCA. What can you say about supporting a guy by "hoping he isn't serious about" doing something he promised to do? Perhaps I'm being too suspicious (tho' certainly no more so than you on McCain's desire to go to war with Russia, by-the-by), but if you have to go into the booth saying, "I really hope the guy I'm voting for was just playing to the crowd when he said what he said," it seems Pollyannaish to me.

Joe:

I know you say that these guys who earn a billion dollars a year represent a tragic injustice. About that, I'm emotionally neutral (hence no "tragic") and uncertain there's any way to show "injustice." I think it equally likely that if they weren't doing what they were doing, the cost might be more than that salary's worth, borne in different forms (failed companies, lost jobs, whatever). When I worked for IBM, I'm glad we had Lou Gerstner. I hope they're donating greatly to charity as Rockefeller and myriad others of the astoundingly well-heeled have done. (Whatever percentage of them are conservative and religious, probably are.)

But something I'm not sure you see is that folks who earn 10 million a year or more, let alone a billion, are just the tiniest sliver of those on whom Obama will raise taxes -- even if the economy overall were unaffected, which we know isn't true.

So, of all the decisions that'll result from increased taxes on the wealthy, maybe 0.01% will be between losing a Lambroghini and laying off twenty workers. (Given the expense of hiring new workers again later, most of the fabulously rich would lose the car anyway.) It'll be between laying off ten workers, or laying off five and shifting the other five overseas, or selling the firm.

If you want to directly target billionaires, just say, "One has no right to possess more than $10 million dollars of net worth and stand on the soil of the U.S. at the same time; anything over that amount is confiscated." (Which'll just hurt the high-end tourist industry.) But even if you could implement it, after you've cut those 2,000 too-tall stalks down to size, you'll have affected the overall federal budget very little.

And I think Obama's tax increases will affect long term revenues very little anyway, since I think we're at or near the Laffer tipping-point everywhere where Obama would raise taxes. There's no more revenue to be squeezed; just spending to be cut, that's all. (That's long-term: A tax increase at a Laffer tipping-point always produces a short-term increase while long-term revenues adjust downward as people gradually adjust behaviors.)

Here's some simple math, my fellow Americans: Let's say for comparison that someone with a middle-class salary pays %10 in taxes from their yearly pay, and let's say they make $100 per week. They would pay $1 per week.
Now let's say I'm a well to do banker and I make say $750 a week, yet I pay just $3 per week in taxes.
Kate, you're right and so are the Republicans- the rich pay WAY more in taxes than the poor- *see above- it's just that it's so unequivocal to be almost silly for these past 8 years.
Oh sure the rich pay more, because they have so much more; but if I make $750 per week and you make $100 per week, maybe just maybe it'd be OK if you pay your $1, and instead of me paying 3$ I pay $3.30! That's right, because Barack Obama that terrorist plans on increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans by about 3%...a little less than taxes under President Clinton. And Oh btw, this would help pay down our national debt, repair our failing infrastructure and relieve the unending burden of our misbegotten invasion that's costing us $10,000,000,000 per month in taxes but mostly it will simply restore some fairness and equanimity to our tax codes at a time when "country first" shouldn't simply be empty advertisement.

Here's some simple math, my fellow Americans: Let's say for comparison that someone with a middle-class salary pays %10 in taxes from their yearly pay, and let's say they make $100 per week. They would pay $1 per week.
Now let's say I'm a well to do banker and I make say $750 a week, yet I pay just $3 per week in taxes.
Kate, you're right and so are the Republicans- the rich pay WAY more in taxes than the poor- *see above- it's just that it's so unequivocal to be almost silly for these past 8 years.
Oh sure the rich pay more, because they have so much more; but if I make $750 per week and you make $100 per week, maybe just maybe it'd be OK if you pay your $1, and instead of me paying 3$ I pay $3.30! That's right, because Barack Obama that terrorist plans on increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans by about 3%...a little less than taxes under President Clinton. And Oh btw, this would help pay down our national debt, repair our failing infrastructure and relieve the unending burden of our misbegotten invasion that's costing us $10,000,000,000 per month in taxes but mostly it will simply restore some fairness and equanimity to our tax codes at a time when "country first" shouldn't simply be empty advertisement.

Scott,

Your "simple math test" breaks down both in its form (because the numbers are nothing like reality) and its conclusions.

I know, of course, that you know the numbers are nothing like reality: You only proposed them for computational ease. So I won't belabor that point.

I'll take issue with terminology long enough to say: When it comes to taxes, one never knows if the "rich" are paying more than the "poor" because our system doesn't tax wealth, but income. It is high-income-earners who pay more (not "the rich") and low-income-earners who pay less -- usually nothing, in fact, once the EITC offsets FICA.

But the conclusions you give are the chief problem.

No, we will not be able to pay for more infrastructure. No, we will not be able to pay down the national debt. No, we won't be able to better afford defense expenditures. Because the kinds of tax-increases Obama proposes do not have a revenue-increasing effect except in the short term (like, the first year), after which, adjusted behavior and circumstances of the taxed will cause revenues to fall in rough proportion to the decline in GDP.

Meanwhile, the reduction of jobs will mean more unemployment claims, producing an increase in government outlays.

Now, to be fair, neither candidate has proposed anything that would balance the budget, because there's just exactly one option for doing so: a sufficient reduction in spending. Neither candidate has proposed anything near the kinds of cuts required.

But of the two candidates, McCain is better in that regard because even with his willingness to keep the in-progress Iraq draw-down fairly slow, he hasn't proposed huge amounts of new spending. Obama's new spending proposals vastly overwhelm the reductions which would come from an accelerated draw-down in Iraq...and anyway, his tax increases and policy-changes, as I said before, will be either revenue-neutral or cause a net reduction in revenue over five years. Because when there's less income to tax, there are fewer tax dollars collected.

So the question is not whether the top 1% of income-earners, who make around 20% of the Gross income in the U.S. but pay around 40% of the income tax dollars, are paying too much or too little.

And it is not about whether the bottom 50% of income-earners, who, comprised as they are of part-timers, make around 12% of the income dollars and pay about 3% of the tax dollars, are paying too much or too little.

It is about the fact that there will be no long-term increase in revenues as a percentage of GDP, no matter what changes you make. There will only be more tax dollars to spend on government programs if GDP rises. That's it.

So if your purpose is to use tax revenues to pay for the business of government, your goal should be to make GDP as high as possible in inflation-adjusted dollars. And you'll find neither candidate good, but McCain far less bad, on that criterion.

On the other hand, if your goal is to satisfy the envy and hatred of the class-conscious, then you can tax the hell out of the rich. Revenues will fall, of course, and the poor will be reduced to a lower lifestyle and level of dignity as the economy tanks, but at least you'll have satisfied your constituents' baser instincts. That always sells well at the polls.

"Country first" is wrong.

A person who says it isn't thereby evil; they're probably just overstating a perfectly noble sentiment.

But I shouldn't like to see it held as a serious mantra, and seriously practiced.

God first. Love of neighbor second. In the political sphere, a conjoining of the two yields: Rule of Law first, in order to make protecting the inalienable rights of individuals (for whom Christ died) practical. Countries are just a tool for doing this, and therefore are a corollary or auxiliary of this derivative conjoining of "God first, neighbor second."

I guess you know all that. But it bears repeating.

Because I want to respond. Stay tuned.

Returning to labor:

I’m not sure exactly what you are referring to when you are speaking of “craftwork”, but I’ll subsume it under what I think should be classified as a product of labor.

When we are talking about capitalist production, which is production specifically for the purpose of exchange in the market place, labor most certainly creates value. Production for exchange presupposes a value to the product and the work that goes into it. No one goes into to business with the expectation that they are creating things of no value.

The point is this: if you are a wage-worker in capitalist society, and not Robinson Crusoe on his island, in a typical business, you are producing (or helping increase, we might say, since most of the real work is done elsewhere) wealth. So we presuppose that the vast majority of Americans and people across the world are creating wealth.

With the disparity in compensation between the average worker and the average CEO being well over 1:400, and with the vast differences in wealth between countries which until only about 60 years ago ruled the world as formal empires and since then as informal financial empires, the injustice should be readily apparent. In the Mondragon I believe that ratio is 1:8, by choice and by democratic decision. They still exist, the sky hasn’t fallen on them, debauchery and evil have not established some special bastion in the Basque region of Spain.

They recognize a simple truth: that what a company earns is the product of all of its workers, of their labor; that labor establishes a just claim to property; ergo, that the laborers should own, control, and distribute amongst themselves the profits and pay the non-productive but essential managers and executives what their education, experience and performance have warranted.

As you know, my preference is more ownership, not greater taxes. In the meantime, though, I have no problem with “soaking the rich”, because their fortunes are social products created by masses of workers, and they should benefit those workers first. As long as a single person is hungry, struggling to pay their medical bills, or unable to pay for college, there shouldn’t be a single executive bonus, expense account, or mega-mansion in existence. This is about distributive justice. If people have a right to the fruits of their labor, then they have a right to demand universal healthcare, free higher education, and anything else that can be directly provided by the wealth they themselves have created.

On Obama:

He also hangs around with Warren Buffet. Obama hangs around with a lot of interesting and diverse people. He is not afraid of different perspectives and sees little value in ideological and social bubbles. That is refreshing to me, not a cause for concern.

I don’t think his statement to the plumber was at all a “slip”. It was entirely true, what he said: when you spread the wealth around, everyone prospers and everyone has a chance. All he needs to add, but which he won’t, because he’s not even as radical as I am, is that this is entirely just, because that wealth was in fact created by those whom he wishes to spread it to.

If this is socialism, I am a socialist. So is the long line of Popes who have pointed out the just claim to property that labor creates, which is the true moral root of the “wealth spreading” argument. Unfortunately Obama only talks about it as a typical liberal; that wealth is to be “redistributed” for the common good. That is not what is really taking place, but because Obama is a modern liberal, and not a distributist much less a proponent of the labor theory of property, he will not frame it in these terms.

His time with community organizations suggest to me that he is dead serious about his bottom-up economic philosophy. Believe it or not, much the radical left in this country is anti-statist and much more interested in improving their local communities. If community organizations had any influence on Obama, it would be an anti-statist, bottom-up, grass roots approach to problems.

Of course Obama was involved with Catholic charities, and nothing nearly as radical as the anarcho-communists I used to know.

And on FOCA - I’ve made this point 100 times here already. Obama can’t sign what doesn’t reach his desk. I don’t think there are enough abortion extremists to get FOCA passed. Not every Democrat is a rabid ideological feminist. Many represent states and districts that would threaten an electoral backlash. I think Obama will govern from the center though because he clearly has the temperament and intellect to see that it is in his best interest to do so. John McCain was the real radical.

On billionaires:

I beg to differ. The Forbes 400 now has a combined worth of 1.6 trillion dollars. That will have no effect on the budget?

In any event, what I want first and foremost is a culture where no one needs or desires to be a billionare, and where those who work share in the wealth they create, not as mere wage-workers but as owners and partners. This is what the Church means when she talks about the dignity and the rights of labor. Human beings are not commodities.

Such an economic transformation would make it much easier to build a culture of life as well.

Joe:

Pertinent to your request in another thread, I've checked back here, and, as you stated, you have a reply that I hadn't addressed. At this point I think it'll be just you an' me, here; the rest of the population of this thread has moved on.

Anyhow, I'll post some responses.

First, as I read your reply, I have some immediate reflections on it:



I don't know if it'll make any difference as to the outcome of your argument, but I see this statement as being usually correct "by coincidence," but not always correct as a tautology.

It is the desire of others to buy that gives the things being sold any value. If no other desires to buy, the thing has no value, and an accumulation of valueless things does not represent wealth. Therefore an accumulation of the fruits of labor does not, in all cases, produce wealth. Therefore desire, not labor, is the source of wealth.

Of course you're mostly right to say "No one goes into to business with the expectation that they are creating things of no value." It's true that most folks only start producing things they're pretty confident others will wish to buy. But -- obviously -- they can be mistaken! And if they mis-read the market, then no matter how much labor they've put in, what they make won't represent the tiniest beginnings of "wealth," but rather a waste of time and a learning experience. (I suppose the learning experience is, in some sense of the word, "wealth" ...but not the sense that's pertinent to this discussion.)

Anyway, I think it clear and incontrovertible that desire produces value and an accumulation of things you value represents "wealth." Putting in a lot of labor often creates value, if one isn't mistaken about market demand. So, the two are generally coincident. But it's not a necessity, and therefore it's not a tautologically correct to say that labor is the source of value.

Well, let me stipulate that in a perfect world populated by only perfect men, I am not confident that the difference between the wages of one man, and the wages of another, would vary by so much. I think it more likely that the difference between the wages of the lowest-earning and the highest-earning, in heaven, might be a ratio of 1:250.

But then again, God is not egalitarian, but rather honors Himself, when He distributes talents and abilities. So to bring honor to Himself He might very well grant to one of his Creatures the ability to produce art which would make that Creature's output -- especially in a perfect world, be esteemed so highly as to result in profits a thousand times greater than those another gained through his own work. And yet both, in a perfect world, would be truly and fully utilizing their gifts.

Now the point of the above observation is to show that, even in Heaven, if men still find it practical to use monetary units as a measure of desire for things, there's no reason to think that some men might not have far more of those units than others. However the others will not envy or covet or be in want; and the former will not hoard or disparage those without, or fail in generosity.

And it follows from this that injustice is not in the numerical disparity per se, but in the actions of men which either led to that disparity, or react to it after it exists.

Now with respect to our fallen world: Here I grant full well that many accumulations of wealth happen through unjust means, and many instances of want result from imperfect actions other than the actions of the person in want.

This is particularly obvious in regions ruled by African and Southeast Asian warlords and South American drug lords. Americans (mostly Christians) send aid and money to such places in huge generous abundance...and it fattens the coffers of tin-plated generals with private armies and scarcely reaches the needy. The needy work and work, and never advance their station, for in such places he who rises above his station is cut down lest he become a threat to el jefe.

But when you long for a more left-leaning mode of economy here in the U.S., Joe, it is not a rectification of the injustices of such strongmen that you seek. So let me turn now to the U.S....

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In the U.S., prices reflect consumer desire pretty closely, though there are instances of intervention which throw the measurements off. But let's say for the sake of argument that prices perfectly reflected desire. Would this, then, mean that the man who got wealthy through his productive output in the U.S. necessarily has accumulated his wealth perfectly morally?

No, it wouldn't, for three pertinent reasons:

1. He may be producing something that he can, just because people want it more, instead of producing something he ought, which people want less and for which he would therefore have less financial gain. An example of this would be a man who remains a professional athlete after being called to the priesthood.

2. The desire of the people may be a real desire, and accurately reflected in the price, but it may be a wrong desire, produced by the warped and fallen nature of those doing the desiring. (It is not wrong to make a toy or gadget, and still less a popular one. But many years around Christmastime consumers fight each other over the "hot" toy or gadget because their desire for it is disproportionate: And naturally, its price rises to a level which it would never have attained in a perfect world.)

3. The producer may be producing what he ought, and getting paid for it as he ought, but he might be neglecting to give adequately from what he accumulates. The famous Rockefeller quote reflects the correct attitude, and goes something like this: "God gives different men different gifts, and always for a purpose. He gave me the gift of making money, and He gave me that gift for the purpose of using it to help those to whom he gave different gifts."

Now those who hold this attitude -- and it's less prevalent among the wealthy in America than it once was, but it's still found, mostly among the wealthy who classify themselves as political conservatives -- are mostly immune to accumulating too much wealth. For, as it accumulates in excess, it flows out proportionally.

Anyway, in a free market system where equal protection under law is enforced, those are the three ways that an wrongful accumulation of wealth may occur : By selling what one ought not, by buying what one ought not, and by failing to give what one ought.

(True, in the U.S., a crook can steal or kill or intimidate or defraud, and thereby accumulate ill-gotten wealth. But that wouldn't happen in a free-market system where a well-written criminal code was well-enforced, and would happen under any economic system where the criminal code was flawed or unenforced. So it isn't really relevant to the question of what kind of economic system is best.)

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Interesting, though, that the country whose "empire" was never anything other than a "financial empire" -- the U.S. -- should have become wealthier than those which actually built empires of occupation and despotism.

But more than that, I hope you're willing to concede the point that while a literal empire, taken by force, represents a moral failing on behalf of those who take it, a figurative empire of successful trade does not necessarily represent a moral failure at all.

It can, of course. The British Opium Trade in China is an obvious example. But when the type of trade involved is (a.) morally licit for the seller, (b.) morally licit for the buyer, (c.) involves neither coercion or fraud by either, and (d.) all wealthy parties are generous and not power-mad with their wealth, then the fact that a "financial empire" is created in the process represents not an evil, but a good.

But that's a side-issue, off the beaten path of the topic we're discussing, to which I now return...

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Well, as I said before, the numerical ratio doesn't necessarily represent injustice, since I think large numerical ratios could exist in a perfect world free from want and fear, for God's glory.

With respect to the Mondragon, it's wonderful that "by choice and by democratic decision," they achieved a 1:8 ratio. Excellent! I'm glad they "still exist" ...for diversity on optional matters is to be applauded even while we insist on unity in things of core importance.

I would never have expected the sky to have "fallen on them" except in the sense that, if they weren't able to obtain certain skills at an adequate degree of competence while maintaining their 1:8 ratio, they might have been presented with a choice between going out of business, or sacrificing their ratio. I can guarantee that had they insisted on a 1:1 ratio, such a thing would have happened!

Let us say that in the Mondragon, you have someone whose skills are worth (N) dollars per hour, and some other person whose skills are worth (15 * N) dollars per hour, and yet they're both working in the Mondragon, one for more than his skills are worth, and another for less, thereby producing your 1:8 ratio.

(I do not, by the way, insist that this is the case. I'm just saying, suppose for the sake of argument that the disparity of the free-market values of the two men's respective skills is more than the Mondragon's ratio permits.)

If this is the case, then the person who's making less than he otherwise could -- assuming he's aware of it and assents -- is participating in a charity cooperative, as well as a commercial cooperative. He's taking a lower salary than he otherwise might, knowing that the difference is going to his lowest-paid coworkers. He is voluntarily giving to his lowest paid coworkers, just like a wealthy American executive might -- though in a more convoluted and circuitous manner. By whatever route, this is almsgiving.

Now let's define or at least describe almsgiving:
1. There is a giver, and a receiver;
2. The giver must know that he's giving;
3. The giver must know to whom he's giving, at least roughly or categorically;
4. The giver must be giving voluntarily;
5. The giver must be intending good for the recipient, by means of the gift;
6. The receiver must accept and not reject the gift;
7. The receiver must understand that the gift was not extracted from the giver by force or fraud but is a freely given gift compelled by nothing but the giver's moral sense, to which he is not entitled as a right apart from love, but which he receives by virtue of the love of his fellow man;
8. Ideally, the receiver feels gratitude and, should he ever himself be in a position to give to the needy, he'll feel morally obligated "pass it on."
9. Ideally, the public does not know the identity of the giver, even if this means the receiver does not know. Yet, ideally, they ought to know about the existence of the gift.

(Items 8 and 9, prefaced as they are with the word "Ideally," are not strictly required. 1-7 are.)

Returning to our hypothetical underpaid and overpaid persons at the Mondragon, I have these questions: Does the receiver know he's getting a gift; i.e., being paid more than his work is worth, by virtue of the generosity of those with whom he works? If not, how can he feel gratitude? How can he feel a moral obligation to "pass it on?"

But these are quibbles, and obviously "debauchery and evil" don't result!

And I certainly wouldn't prohibit men from entering such a voluntary contractual arrangement. If it was found to be superior in some way, I might incentivize it, mildly and indirectly, through public policy.

Over all this, keep in mind: Because the Mondragon is a voluntary-membership organization, it is utterly unconnected to the types of government policy I oppose.

...continued...

...continued...

But not only their labor. Sheer undirected labor is valueless; the choices made in directing that labor toward producing things valued by customers are equally vital. Without the labor being done; there is no production; without the correct choices, the production is not of anything with value.

No, I deny that -- unless I misunderstand what you mean by it.

If a laborer produces something nobody wants, he has no just claim to their money in exchange for it. They are, after all, not his slaves, that he can make them work hours to produce money, and then force them to give up the product of their work in exchange for something they do not value.

He has a just claim to what he has produced, of course! If I buy a seed, grow from it a tree in my own yard, cut it down with my own saw, and make from it a carving with my own knife and my own artistic skill, I have a just claim on the yard, the tree, the saw, and the carving. But I have no just claim on someone else to buy the carving at all, let alone at some particular price.

So actual labor value is proportional to the desire of others for that work to be done. Just labor value is proportional to the morally correct desire of others for that work to be done.

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There, I think, is where you go awry. Not about ownership: If they can afford to buy in, why shouldn't they?

But you classify managers as being "non-productive but essential" which is both logically self-contradictory and insulting to the work they do, casting it as a sort of mafioso's protection-racket.

If the product sold, then the managers and executives were extremely productive. For sitting at a desk making decisions is easy work; but sitting at a desk and making correct decisions is extremely difficult work. Additionally, getting up from the desk and exerting leadership skills and maintaining important relationships after one has exerted the brainpower required to make correct decisions is also difficult work, tho' of course some are more suited to it than others, and thus enjoy it more than others. (We all tend to work more effectively and joyfully when working within our divine gifting.)

You seem to have an impression of how executives and managers spend their days which is way off from reality, especially among small business owners. Most Americans work for firms with fewer than 100 employees and only 1 or 2 private owners. Most job creation comes from that sector. And within that sector, business owners and managers work sixty hour weeks, attend trade shows and conferences and continuing education and certification classes, get calls at home to handle human-resources issues, show up when the burglar alarm goes off for no reason at 2AM down at the store, and so on. They have to navigate the labyrinth of OSHA, EPA, NLRB, and other regulations. They have to file tax returns which are honest yet minimize taxes, because of their simultaneous duties to the law and to their shareholders and profit-sharing employees. Most tiring of all, they repeatedly have to deal with other fallen human beings. They have to suffer fools, if not gladly, at least patiently.

In short, they have to do a lot of stuff which average persons are both unwilling to do and incompetent to do. The kind of folk who can do it competently for a small business number perhaps 1 out of every hundred adults. For a medium-sized business, perhaps 1 out of every thousand. For a Fortune 500 firm, perhaps 1 out of a few hundred thousands.

Which, of course, is why it's a "seller's market" for their services, and they can command high salaries. Like Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, they have a gift.

Now, God gives such gifts for important purposes, and high on the list of purposes is that they might in turn give to others. "He blesses us that we might be a blessing." So, to the extent that such folks don't give out of their wealth, they pervert their gift.

But that doesn't change the rarity of the gift or the need for it. The price system doesn't set the value of the gift; it's the needs or desires of others that does that. The price system is only the messenger of that information. Don't shoot the messenger! ...lest we all cease to receive that vital information!

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Fine, good...

...who, without them, would have had nothing. So the workers' jobs and paychecks are also social products created by masses of owners and managers and executives.

"First?" I have no particular objection to paying janitors on Tuesday, receptionists on Wednesday, salespersons on Thursday, middle-managers on Friday, and executives on Saturday. But that's not what you meant.

You meant either that janitors should be paid more, and executives less, and that we should complain loudly to the executives about it -- in which case I have no objection -- or that the janitors should be paid more, and the executives less, and that we should stick a gun in their faces to make sure of it -- in which case I object not to your opinion, which I may or may not agree with in a particular circumstance, but to your means of getting your way.


Ah! So it is about need, in the end? Not about leveling the playing-field? Or, is it more about leveling the playing field?

Let's find out what really matters to you.

Let's say you have a choice. For the purposes of this question, please assume it's hypothetical....

You may choose either:

(A.) An economy in which the mean buying power of those in the poorest 20% is sufficient for them to rent a heated and air-conditioned apartment, buy groceries, afford in-state community college if they can get in, pay for minimal medical coverage, and save about $50 a month, but wear only clothes purchased from Goodwill, and cannot afford any non-essentials beyond what their grandparents would have had a half-century earlier, AND in which the wealthiest 1%, if they aren't generous about charity, can afford a yacht, three mansions apiece, and enough accumulated retirement savings to give them a retirement income that's a hundred times the mean income of the poorest 20%;

OR,

(B.) An economy in which the mean buying power of those in the poorest 20% is insufficient for them to have shelter but government provides low-quality housing, insufficient to keep them nourished but government gives them minimal food allowances, insufficient to afford better education but government gives them a bad one, insufficient to buy any competent medical care but government offers them incompetent care, and insufficient to save money for later even if they deny themselves all luxury spending and live like their grandparents did...AND in which the most productive business-owners live not like kings but like middle-class Americans, unless they have government connections, in which case they still live like kings, and can wield coercive power through government office, to boot.

Assuming you had that hypothetical choice, would you not opt for (A.)?

Or is it more important that the non-government-connected business owners be cut down from yacht-owning to owning only one house, and two cars?

I agree: Profligate spending when others are in need is obnoxious. But if the choice is between allowing that obnoxious behavior while simultaneously better meeting the needs of the poor, and disallowing it while simultaneously doing a marginally worse job of meeting the needs of the poor, which would you choose?

Now, I believe that's the actual choice. You will, I'm sure, disagree. And we can debate about how realistic and factual that choice is, as a separate discussion.

But supposing for the sake of argument that it's the real choice, do you not think it's more important to help the poor, than to hurt the rich? Is that not what the "preferential option for the poor" would counsel?

Inquiring minds want to know. (I want to know!)

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About my hypothetical example:

My intent was to compare the results of the laws of the United States with the laws of Venezuela or Bolivia.

You correctly noted once that such countries forbid abortion (which does not, sadly, mean it's unavailable, but it's rare and costs a lot), and you correctly noted that their laws are in that area more moral than those of the U.S. I agree.

But you also said that their laws were, in economic matters, morally superior to those of the U.S., and there I disagree vehemently.

So I created that hypothetical choice, and though I painted Venezuela or Bolivia exactly as they are, I painted the U.S. worse than it is.

For the mean income of the lowest 20% of income earners in the U.S. is sufficient for the things I described, and then some, if the person making that income will also live as frugally as I described.

In fact, most don't live that frugally, and still the vast majority of those in the bottom quintile manage, at some later point in their lives, to ascend upward by one or two quintiles. Most poor in the U.S. are young, and become middle-class when they are older. Look it up, it's a fact.

In the meantime, opportunities are far better in the U.S., and the ability of a person who works his way to a better life to keep what he earns is far more assured. The low-cost health care in the U.S. -- and keep in mind that in the U.S. doctors are required by law to treat those who can't pay, unless it's something optional -- far exceeds (in quality) the free care in Bolivia and Venezuela, by all reports.

And here, a person can become wealthy and powerful apart from the government. There, wealth and power are distributed by government, to the friends of the government. I know which option I think is safer for liberty. (Just ask a Venezuelan journalist!)

Finally, remember that there's another moral law at work here, and it's Scriptural: "He who will not work, ought not to eat." (I could add the bits in Proverbs about "the sluggard," but they're voiced more as observations than commands.)

The plain fact is that in central command-and-control economies, such as those enacted by such strongmen as Chavez, productivity and lifestyle are disconnected. The U.S., despite its flaws, doesn't have that problem.

In a fallen world, the options usually stink, but give me the Aristocracy of Ability over the Aristocracy of Government Nepotism, any day!

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Me neither. I suspect his actual governance will be far more monolithic than his friendships. Kudos to him for the friendships, but I'd be far more supportive of him if I thought that he were pro-life, or pro-vouchers, or anti-gay marriage, or pro-HSA, or anti-EFCA, or anything else which would indicate a violation of the expectations and hopes of the left.

Since we've elected him chief executive, not chief schmoozer, those policy items matter to me rather more.


I think that history proves that to be false, when government redistribution is the manner of the spreading.


I think that's partly false, because the wealth was already as correctly distributed to those who contributed to its production as it's ever likely to be.


Well, duh!


I disagree. The more I read the Compendium and the associated works, the more convinced I am that the Church, while addressing the terrible inequities which resulted at a specific time and which aren't comparable to our circumstances in the U.S. today, went out of its way to not go as far as European Socialists would have liked, and approve specific redistributive forms.

Instead, the teaching focuses on results, and several times states that the methods of achieving those results are not in their purview.

The Universal Destination of Goods is more effectively accomplished in the U.S. than Latin America. While it is sad that many waste their limited buying power on trinkets rather than on savings, and while I would favor a reduction in consumerist and debt-encouraging media messages to effect a reduction in such behaviors, it remains true that the mean buying power of the bottom quintile of Americans roughly equals the mean buying power of the middle quintile of Europeans and probably of the next-to-highest quintile of South Americans. Put simply, the U.S. is better at getting the most buying power into the hands of the poor, and if it takes allowing obnoxious behavior from the Paris Hiltons of the world to achieve that, then I'll take that trade, and try to enjoy flinging tomatoes at the T.V. every time her smug skanky face appears.


Which I would characterize as being very top-down. Funny how language goes that way.


Oh, I totally believe that! Stalin's term for them, I believe, was "useful idiots." Because the policy changes for which they advocate cannot be implemented without expanding, by precedent, the scope of government's authority. And once that scope is expanded, government always uses the full extent of it. Just as a liberal who's been mugged is called a "conservative," so a communist who's had to live with the consequences of communism is called a "libertarian." Sadly, most of the remaining communists, roaming quasi-wild in those preserve parks called college campuses, haven't experienced the consequences of communism, save now and again as an honored guest of the state.

I'm out of time for the evening, and I suppose that's plenty to respond to, anyhow.

Joe:


I'll be surprised if it doesn't reach his desk.


All of them in the leadership, however, are, and they're sailing with a fresh wind of "mandate" behind them. I think that in reality, the mandate is to have less contentiousness in D.C., and that Obama's cool style won over McCain's grumpy style, preventing any clash on substance this year. But everyone likes to think their electoral victory represents a victory of their ideas, and the Democrats will likely overplay their mandate by at least a bit.

Moreover, something like FOCA will be "passed," in every meaningful sense, by the Supreme Court fiat in about ten (-ish) years. For of course all the oldest justices will be replaced by youthful Ginsberg types. If one of those is Scalia, God help us!

But even if he is not, the replacement of Stevens, Ginsberg, and possibly Kennedy leaves us relying on some hypothetical future combination of a conservative President and a conservative-or-divided Senate to produce youthful pro-life replacements for Scalia and Thomas just to keep the current even balance. It could happen, of course. We could get lucky. But one would rather not play poker with a handful of trash, when one's opponent already has a flush, hoping that the next draw from the deck will be lucky enough to transform your hand into something equivalent.

So, Obama's election makes FOCA, or something similar, pretty likely either by legislation or judicial fiat, either in the short-term or the long. And that's putting aside its effects on euthanasia, on doctor-assisted suicide, on gay marriage....


Yes, they will. But a lot can be done during one's "honeymoon period" that wouldn't fly at other times. Obama with a Democratic Congress and a uniformly friendly mainstream media is an unchecked political power: I anticipate that he'll make use of it.


I respect you, Joe, but this evaluation seems pure fantasy to me. C'mon, be a hard-nosed realist: There's a difference between how someone talks and what decisions he makes. (Look at how Bill Clinton spoke of women's rights, versus how he treated women!)

Obama's voting record, what there is of it, is hard, hard left: In a clump with Sanders and Kucinich and Pelosi. Ditto for his record in state office. McCain, meanwhile, was a constant thorn in the side of Republicans, which is why so few conservatives were planning to vote for him. It took Palin to get the Republican base to the polls; they'd have stayed home (or in my case, voted Barr, Baldwin, or Blank) otherwise. Compare the NARAL ratings of the two men. Compare their ratings by other groups, left and right. That's numerical data.

Or, go beyond the numbers: Why was McCain considered a "maverick" amongst Republicans...because he always voted party line?! Hardly. And Obama has exactly zero reputation as a "maverick" amongst Democrats, because he was so entirely in line with Chicago left-wing politics as to have made nary a ripple of dissent while forming his base there. The sole action in his political history which dissented in any way from his party was to run for the Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton...by running to her left.

Now those are objective facts: Numerical data. Historical events. Manner of speech doesn't enter into it.

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...wrapping up...


Actually, I'm not clear what point of mine you're replying to, here.


Well, there are two things there: "Needs" and "Desires."

On "needs," well, you already have that, so be glad: You got your wish! No-one in the U.S. needs to be a billionaire!

As for "desires," well, sorry to say, you can't have that until after the Second Coming. Until then, there will be those who desire to be billionaires, for reasons good and bad. (After the Second Coming, it would only be for good reasons.)


There, you and I agree about goals, and merely disagree about methods.

I want every single janitor in the U.S. to be an independent investor, saving his pennies not in a mattress but in something that can get 5% or higher returns, in the long-term, after inflation. As our janitor ages (by which time he'd probably change jobs several times, so "janitor" isn't the best term anyway) he should progressively move out of high-risk high-growth into low-risk low-growth securities: A gradual shift from SPDR's and index funds to CD's. If he's within 10 years of retirement, it's all CD's, T-bills, and the like.

Now because diversified portfolios can "diversify out sector-specific risk," it's important that no more than 10% of his investments be tied up in his own company. After all, if his company folds, you don't want him to lose both his job, and his savings, simultaneously!

And, of course, he should stay out of debt. I'd happily change current law to more strongly incentivize that.

Anyhow, the overall strategy is to create an ownership society. People should save and invest, more than spend, and should avoid debt. Current tax incentives encourage spending; so those incentives should be reversed.

That approach is wise: That Book-Of-Proverbs type of wisdom which doesn't always pan out, but does so 95% of the time. Some folks would still have a hard life, but fewer than do right now. (And "right now" is already amazingly good by the historical standards of human civilizations!)


No, they aren't.

But "This" -- the philosophical and policy approach you espouse -- is rather more specific than what the Church means when she talks about the dignity and the rights of labor. She repeatedly says that she rejects both communism and "unbridled" capitalism, which she defines as a sort of neo-Darwinian approach not only to economics but to legal protections and personal charity as well, something no influential conservative or even libertarian has ever supported (not even Ayn Rand, who came closest but still advocated equal protection under law).

My own specific philosophical and policy approach also is not directly preferred by Church teaching. However, I think it has a more proven track-record than yours of actually getting the results the Church intends. Which is why I support it.

I had no idea you'd come back here and posted all this.

We really ought to exchange email addresses or something so we can notify one another. I hope you're still checking.

Well, I guess I'll get cracking on a reply. If only I could get paid for THIS... sigh.

Ok, let us continue.

“It is the desire of others to buy that gives the things being sold any value. If no other desires to buy, the thing has no value, and an accumulation of valueless things does not represent wealth. Therefore an accumulation of the fruits of labor does not, in all cases, produce wealth. Therefore desire, not labor, is the source of wealth.”

Here is where you and I have a fundamental disagreement, and where I suspect many people similar to us also do. To say that labor creates wealth is not the same as saying that all labor under all conditions creates wealth. This is an illogical presumption that you and others make, not me.

Not all labor creates wealth, but all wealth is the product of labor. That is the proposition before you.

This is not a new notion, a purely Marxian notion; it is as at least as old as Locke, and possibly as old as Aristotle. The former writes in his Second Treatise:

“It is labour then which puts the greatest part of value upon land, without which it would scarcely be worth any thing: it is to that we owe the greatest part of all its useful products; for all that the straw, bran, bread, of that acre of wheat, is more worth than the product of an acre of as good land, which lies waste, is all the effect of labour: for it is not barely the plough-man's pains, the reaper's and thresher's toil, and the baker's sweat, is to be counted into the bread we eat; the labour of those who broke the oxen, who digged and wrought the iron and stones, who felled and framed the timber employed about the plough, mill, oven, or any other utensils, which are a vast number, requisite to this corn, from its being feed to be sown to its being made bread, must all be charged on the account of labour, and received as an effect of that: nature and the earth furnished only the almost worthless materials, as in themselves.” (sec. 5, par. 43)

How these self-evident truths became buried under a spectacular pile of theoretical rubbish in the late 19th century by the “marginal revolution” would be another interesting topic to take up at a later time. Unfortunately the view you espouse, which is a pretty popular view in America and elsewhere, is the result of this theoretically inexplicable, but politically expedient and wholesale rejection of the classical labor theory of value (it could have been updated and made relevant, but instead it was tossed aside for reasons I think have nothing to do with the quest for scientific truth).

It is true that a product that no one wants is worthless. But desire only tells us that a thing is valuable in general; it tells us nothing about how valuable it is. You can desire something a great deal, but how much you will ultimately pay for it also depends upon the conditions under which it is produced, as I think anyone involved in production would attest to. These conditions set limits on the value or the price if you like that are entirely independent of demand.

Finally, we are talking about a specific and concrete social problem; how the wealth of society is appropriated and distributed among the various groups therein. The tangible existence of a sum of wealth in the form of revenues or profits presupposes that wealth has been created, which in turn presupposes the union of man, machine and raw materials; or simply the labor process. Once the deed is done, we need no longer speculate whether or not the labor is or is not creating wealth. The proof is in the pudding.

In the same way, it would be illogical of me to declare that all decisions and desires, your preferred factors, must lead to wealth creation in order for any of them to.

If we are adhering to the labor theory of property, that labor creates a just claim to property, then at the very least every laborer has an indisputable right to ownership and control of a share of the profits. If we could agree to this, we could move on to other issues. But we shall see as I continue to address your points.

“But -- obviously -- they can be mistaken!”

Indeed they can be. But what wealth that does exist, that is actually appropriated and actually distributed and actually consumed, is in question here, not that which might have been.

“Well, let me stipulate that in a perfect world populated by only perfect men, I am not confident that the difference between the wages of one man, and the wages of another, would vary by so much. I think it more likely that the difference between the wages of the lowest-earning and the highest-earning, in heaven, might be a ratio of 1:250.”

That’s quite an arbitrary number. In our technologically advanced society, I find it impossible to believe that one man is worth 250 times any other man. There is little we can do, at least in terms of production, that robots and computer models can’t do. Everything from marketing to investing to scientific research is done by trained professionals, not exceptionally rare geniuses. Those professionals do not make 250 times the average worker. They are paid what their work is worth. The executives whose compensations are tied to stock options, ridiculous bonuses, golden parachutes, expense accounts, tax evasion and other parasitic activity are the ones on the right side of that ratio.

“But then again, God is not egalitarian, but rather honors Himself, when He distributes talents and abilities.”

I’m not an egalitarian either, or at least I don’t have to be in order to hold this position; simple Aristotelian political philosophy 101 suffices. Extremes of wealth and poverty lead to the dissolution of the body politic. The key to social stability is a thriving middle class where no one is either too poor or too rich. But there is still room in the middle for some to excel and for others to drop down a bit. We also have the added Christian perspective of the inherent dignity of every person, and in the eyes of the Church this includes economic justice, especially with respect to the family.

“But when you long for a more left-leaning mode of economy here in the U.S., Joe, it is not a rectification of the injustices of such strongmen that you seek. So let me turn now to the U.S.…”

Au contraire, my friend. Never forget or presume otherwise that when I speak of the US economy I am speaking not only of the conditions of Americans but of people worldwide. The US dominates the global economy and sets the agenda in many respects through its leadership of the international financial institutions. Economic imperialism is alive and well under the aegis of globalization, and the development of the third world is often tampered with by the machinations of the first. The Church has also spoken strongly about the gap between rich and poor countries. See the Compendium for that.

On your moral challenges to wealth accumulation:

I don’t dispute your oughts and shoulds and wrongs. I will be the first to agree that in our society we have a very disordered set of economic priorities. There are millions of workers around the world producing things that harm other people, the environment, the cultural atmosphere, etc. Many millions more participate as consumers. We need to find ways to wean off of the things that are ruining our lives and destroying society. No argument from me there.

But assuming we addressed all that, we would still have the same problems of appropriation and distribution, of the various claims to wealth that I have been raising thus far. So these are really two different issues. Your wrongful accumulation scenarios are entirely unrelated to the question of economic justice, or more specifically distributive justice.

Finally, most people have families to feed and bills to pay; we cannot always be as discriminating as we like as wage laborers or as consumers, especially when we are financially strapped. Your athlete has some pretty clear options. Others have to take the jobs they can or be put out on the street. I know that from personal experience. I don’t think it is our responsibility acting AS workers or AS consumers to deal with these problems. It is our responsibility as citizens and Christians. Otherwise you end up looking ridiculous, like Bill O’Reilly’s hot air boycotts of products and entire countries he finds morally offensive.

“Interesting, though, that the country whose "empire" was never anything other than a "financial empire" -- the U.S. -- should have become wealthier than those which actually built empires of occupation and despotism.”

What is interesting is how you could overlook US imperial history. We did not peacefully romp across the continent from sea to shining sea. We killed and/or relocated millions of Native Americans, engaged in wars with Britain, Mexico and Spain, enslaved an entire race of human beings, and, yes, built a financial empire. Never anything other? Tell that to the Cherokee.

That said, yes, we have always been more free. We also had great safety valves a lot of those other places didn’t have - lots and lots of land, and lots and lots of immigrants. We didn’t become an old-school empire because we didn’t have to. Why fight over India when you can make the Louisiana Purchase?

“But more than that, I hope you're willing to concede the point that while a literal empire, taken by force, represents a moral failing on behalf of those who take it, a figurative empire of successful trade does not necessarily represent a moral failure at all.”

Not necessarily, no.

Regarding the Mondragon:

From what I have read, in fact, there is a balanced approach between meeting a just pay ratio and remaining competitive with respect to the local market. Frankly, the specific ratio isn’t as important as the forces that are responsible for the final number. The market alone would never create a 1:450 ratio between two workers, between the lowest paid janitor and the highest paid executive, like, for instance, the president of the US. It is disparities in ownership and in effective control that are responsible for these ridiculous imbalances. No accountability, transparency, or even tax payments and compliance with regulations.

“Returning to our hypothetical underpaid and overpaid persons at the Mondragon, I have these questions: Does the receiver know he's getting a gift; i.e., being paid more than his work is worth, by virtue of the generosity of those with whom he works? If not, how can he feel gratitude? How can he feel a moral obligation to "pass it on?”

I disagree that they are being paid more than they are worth, only that some are not making quite as much there as they might make at other firms which frankly do not pay workers what they are worth and are therefore able to lavish more on executives.

“Over all this, keep in mind: Because the Mondragon is a voluntary-membership organization, it is utterly unconnected to the types of government policy I oppose.”

Well, that’s good to know, and I’m glad you think it ought to be given incentives by the government because that is the sort of policy I support.

“But not only their labor. Sheer undirected labor is valueless; the choices made in directing that labor toward producing things valued by customers are equally vital. Without the labor being done; there is no production; without the correct choices, the production is not of anything with value.”

If by choices and directing you mean the labor of executives, I don’t disagree; it is labor and I always include it. It is even more valuable labor because it costs more to produce an executive than it does an assembly line worker. The problem is that the difference between them is not 1:450. The inflated number comes from disproportionate ownership. In many if not most cases, the workers own nothing. In some cases they own shares, or they have things like 401ks which they can’t even touch and which can be wiped out by the decisions of people who are effectively, if not on paper, entirely unaccountable.

“If a laborer produces something nobody wants, he has no just claim to their money in exchange for it.”

That is not the claim. You are making another illogical leap. First, even the valueless thing nobody wants still rightfully belongs to those who produced it. A thing doesn’t have to have exchange value in order to be property. No one wants my old socks but they’re still mine.

No one has ever argued that a claim to the products of labor is an automatic claim to some sum of money. It doesn’t follow AT ALL from the premise that labor creates a claim to property that labor also creates a claim to money. If the property, the product, can’t be exchanged for money, then so be it.

But this is NOT the economy we have now, so if you agree the workers have a just claim to the products they create, you disagree with the way the whole economy is set up now.

Managers:

“But you classify managers as being "non-productive but essential" which is both logically self-contradictory and insulting to the work they do, casting it as a sort of mafioso's protection-racket.”

Well, if you want to take offense, I can’t stop you, but I’m not using these terms with any sort of emotional meaning. By productive I mean work that creates wealth. Executive decisions are important for the movement of wealth but do not themselves create it. Like all professionals they are the true wage laborers. Because they are professionals they are more highly skilled and highly valued. Competition among professionals creates more competent professionals. Among unskilled workers and their undifferentiated labor, the vast majority of humanity, it creates nothing but misery.

That said, though, it does become a bit of a Mafioso protection racket when it is assumed that only a select few individuals are capable of making decisions. I am not saying that every decision, which under the best conditions would be determined by scientific insight and what is best for the firm and society, should be subject to a vote. At the very least there needs to be a sort of representative hierarchy, and the major decisions should be subject to votes. This is what naturally follows from a just distribution of ownership.

I hope then we can dispense of all this talk about what executives actually do.

“You seem to have an impression of how executives and managers spend their days which is way off from reality, especially among small business owners.”

It is true that I am generally talking about larger firms, and you are right to point out that most Americans work in small firms. I think there need to be more large firms that are run cooperatively and democratically, not more small firms run despotically. I think the continued existence of small business on such a wide scale is actually the product of government intervention; trust busting, market caps, laws against price fixing, subsidies and easy access to credit, without which larger companies would swallow many of them whole.

I don’t know what you think my impression is, though. I don’t deny that they work hard. I just deny that they create wealth. And in fact, I deny that most American workers create real wealth. The service sector really just moves around the wealth created in the third world and extracted here. And that is what, 70% or more of the American workforce? I question the value added to the McDonalds hamburger, for instance, by the worker who simply puts the ingredients between the buns and heats it up. The wealth was created in the pastures, slaughterhouses and meat packing plants of South America most likely.

I’m not sure that we even create wealth in this country, and I think that is the chief underlying cause of the financial meltdown we’re in. Does the American system work, this wholesale replacement of manufacturing with services, with finance and information technology? I think the decline in real wages, the corresponding skyrocketing of consumer debt, and the financial collapse all answer that in the negative. Our standard of living is based upon a flawed and false economy where nothing is exchanged for nothing over and again until the whole thing goes up in smoke. All to satisfy the insatiable appetites of the American consumer, the planetary parasite. Well, we had a trans-Atlantic slave-trade in order to satisfy the sweet tooth of Europe’s middle and upper classes too.

So please don’t think I am singling out small business owners. Parasitism is a problem that runs from top to bottom in America. But the working class and most small businessmen don’t have a say in how the economy is organized and run. They simply find their way within it. Unfortunately these debates always get framed in the “what is best for some section of the American population”, when the truth is that no matter who wins here, many others are losing in other countries.

Of course, that presumes that everyone has access to a quality education and a decent home life. Our democracy as it is, is far from perfect. But just as few suggest throwing it out altogether because of the fickleness and stupidity of some of the electorate, there is no reason not to advance the principle into the economy because of the same potential for stupidity. It can be managed. The benefits outweigh the costs.

“Ah! So it is about need, in the end? Not about leveling the playing-field? Or, is it more about leveling the playing field?”

These are not mutually exclusive. The need is that the playing field be brought within reasonable limits (not flattened).

On your economic choice:

If those were the actual choices of course I would choose A. As you say, it is much more important to me that the poor are helped, than the rich are hurt - if you want to call being reduced from billions to perhaps modest millions being “hurt”. The top 1% of income earners owns nearly 40% of the wealth in this country. That is ridiculous. There is no justification for that. No amount of wealth-creating labor could be responsible for the disparity.

I don’t disagree that perhaps much of it - though not all - was acquired legitimately, but that only shows how out of date and irrational the legal framework is. It is possible to obey the law and still commit an injustice, because sometimes the law hasn’t caught up to reality. I find those who equate legality with justice in some absolute, final sense to be dangerous, as if the law itself creates justice and not higher considerations. Things like Jim Crow and poll taxes were once the law of the land, after all.

“Now, I believe that's the actual choice. You will, I'm sure, disagree. And we can debate about how realistic and factual that choice is, as a separate discussion.”

You are right about that. I do disagree, but only in the sense that if we organized the economy in such a way that economic justice were provided to all, not only here in America but worldwide (and don’t tell me we can’t get a good start with modern communication technology) - if we did that, then the massive fortunes of the top 1% in America or the top 1% worldwide would become impossible.

It would mean that ownership is more equitably distributed in the vast majority of firms, that the pay scale and other accounting matters come under public scrutiny and democratic accountability, if not direct control, that local communities become partners in local business. All of this would be entirely incompatible with the current plutocratic structure. Every move made towards justice, and every injustice remedied, would mean more wealth in the hands of, and under the control of, the people to whom it rightfully belongs and hopefully those in the communities who need it most, and less of it in the hands of a small clique of executive oligarchs and distant shareholders.

Suppose I’m wrong about that. If I really am, if economic justice is compatible with the existence of such massive fortunes in private hands, I would say “fine, let it be”. But if it isn’t, if I’M right, which do you prefer? That a few people get to accumulate without limit in the name of “liberty”, or that everyone gets a chance to prosper in the name of justice?

“So I created that hypothetical choice, and though I painted Venezuela or Bolivia exactly as they are, I painted the U.S. worse than it is.”

I know your intentions are good but your sources I will question. Venezuela and Bolivia are not worse off or that much better off than similar countries. They’re all poor countries. To me if there is a greater distribution of the national wealth, workers rights, functioning social services, there is a basic morality to the economy that is sorely lacking in places like China and India. In Peru and Colombia union organizers and leaders are routinely assassinated.

You are also right about social mobility in the US, about the generational upward movement, though many sociologists speculate that for the first time the next generation may suffer a drop and not an increase in living standards.

I made a mistake copying and pasting! Response 5 does not follow from Response 4. After response 4 please follow my New Response 5.

“Which, of course, is why it's a "seller's market" for their services, and they can command high salaries. Like Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, they have a gift.”

Ha! I couldn’t disagree more. Colleges handout business administration degrees as if they were cotton candy. Trust me, I know people who, to stay with your sports analogy, would be lucky to get the ball in the hoop or on the green who went through four years of college, got a degree, a little start up capital from their parents, and went into business.

This is what you take away from Ayn Rand, I suspect. The world would fall apart without economic supermen. Meanwhile the faceless masses will always be there to offer their undifferentiated capacity to work, like any ox, cow, or well trained chimp.

Back to reality: as education continues to improve, more and more functions can be assumed by more people - the price of these people, these 1 in 100s, will drop as they become 1 in 10s. Who would have thought 1000 years ago that the average man could also be a statesman with a share in the political direction of the state? Beyond Athens and its allies, for a flicker in the ancient world, it was a pipe dream. Now literacy and education have made it not only possible, but a requirement of justice. The same will happen with business management, my friend.

Of course, that presumes that everyone has access to a quality education and a decent home life. Our democracy as it is, is far from perfect. But just as few suggest throwing it out altogether because of the fickleness and stupidity of some of the electorate, there is no reason not to advance the principle into the economy because of the same potential for stupidity. It can be managed. The benefits outweigh the costs.

“Ah! So it is about need, in the end? Not about leveling the playing-field? Or, is it more about leveling the playing field?”

These are not mutually exclusive. The need is that the playing field be brought within reasonable limits (not flattened).

On your economic choice:

If those were the actual choices of course I would choose A. As you say, it is much more important to me that the poor are helped, than the rich are hurt - if you want to call being reduced from billions to perhaps modest millions being “hurt”. The top 1% of income earners owns nearly 40% of the wealth in this country. That is ridiculous. There is no justification for that. No amount of wealth-creating labor could be responsible for the disparity.

I don’t disagree that perhaps much of it - though not all - was acquired legitimately, but that only shows how out of date and irrational the legal framework is. It is possible to obey the law and still commit an injustice, because sometimes the law hasn’t caught up to reality. I find those who equate legality with justice in some absolute, final sense to be dangerous, as if the law itself creates justice and not higher considerations. Things like Jim Crow and poll taxes were once the law of the land, after all.

“Now, I believe that's the actual choice. You will, I'm sure, disagree. And we can debate about how realistic and factual that choice is, as a separate discussion.”

You are right about that. I do disagree, but only in the sense that if we organized the economy in such a way that economic justice were provided to all, not only here in America but worldwide (and don’t tell me we can’t get a good start with modern communication technology) - if we did that, then the massive fortunes of the top 1% in America or the top 1% worldwide would become impossible.

It would mean that ownership is more equitably distributed in the vast majority of firms, that the pay scale and other accounting matters come under public scrutiny and democratic accountability, if not direct control, that local communities become partners in local business. All of this would be entirely incompatible with the current plutocratic structure. Every move made towards justice, and every injustice remedied, would mean more wealth in the hands of, and under the control of, the people to whom it rightfully belongs and hopefully those in the communities who need it most, and less of it in the hands of a small clique of executive oligarchs and distant shareholders.

Suppose I’m wrong about that. If I really am, if economic justice is compatible with the existence of such massive fortunes in private hands, I would say “fine, let it be”. But if it isn’t, if I’M right, which do you prefer? That a few people get to accumulate without limit in the name of “liberty”, or that everyone gets a chance to prosper in the name of justice?

“So I created that hypothetical choice, and though I painted Venezuela or Bolivia exactly as they are, I painted the U.S. worse than it is.”

I know your intentions are good but your sources I will question. Venezuela and Bolivia are not worse off or that much better off than similar countries. They’re all poor countries. To me if there is a greater distribution of the national wealth, workers rights, functioning social services, there is a basic morality to the economy that is sorely lacking in places like China and India. In Peru and Colombia union organizers and leaders are routinely assassinated.

You are also right about social mobility in the US, about the generational upward movement, though many sociologists speculate that for the first time the next generation may suffer a drop and not an increase in living standards.

You are also right about all these advantages the US has. It is easy for the colossus that bestrides the world to have economic advantages, for Uncle Sam to hand them out like candy to its constituents, while keeping one boot firmly planted on the economies of the rest of the world. Of course we have higher quality free care, we have higher quality everything. Higher quality is a function of higher wealth, and it doesn’t grow on money trees. It’s grown in the places you compare to the US.

“Finally, remember that there's another moral law at work here, and it's Scriptural: "He who will not work, ought not to eat." (I could add the bits in Proverbs about "the sluggard," but they're voiced more as observations than commands.)”

Scripture never mentions structural unemployment. In those simple times every person had to struggle to survive. Now machines have made many of us obsolete and we are lucky to find employment.

In any case I note that the operational word is “will”. If there is a will but no way, I think we can spare the extra food.

“The plain fact is that in central command-and-control economies, such as those enacted by such strongmen as Chavez, productivity and lifestyle are disconnected. The U.S., despite its flaws, doesn't have that problem.”

I would say though that these problems are interrelated. Strongmen like Chavez emerge from a long history of US imperial meddling in the affairs of Latin America and the grip that the IFI’s in general have had over the region. These insulated, quasi-socialist regimes are a throwback to earlier times when protection of industry was seen as a basic condition for national survival. It may be so again today. This time though it is WE here who must change. Latin American countries have every right to be suspicious and defensive. There would be fewer Chavezs if in history there had been fewer United Fruits.

Now, on Obama, I only brought up the people he hangs around with because you made it an issue first. Now you say you don’t care who his friends are. That’s fine. It is irrelevant, I agree.

And don’t you think its silly for you to constantly remind me that you are pointing out facts, and then point to the difference between Bill Clinton’s supposed support for women’s rights and the way he treated women? Wouldn’t the policies he supported be the facts to look at?

I have no interest in defending Obama. What I really wanted was for McCain to lose, because I thought he was far more dangerous. Obama still supports a lot of things that I reject, abortion being only one of them.

But I do think it is silly to cast him in the mold of a radical leftist when he has promised to do practically nothing to alter America’s status as an empire. He is simply going to pursue a less reckless imperial policy, which maybe buys us all a little more time to get our act together. He also MIGHT do some things that I think will help the poor and middle class, and not hurt them, which is an added bonus.

This “most liberal member of the Senate” line is just an old Republican campaign talking point pulled out of stock and applied to everyone. John Kerry was the “most liberal senator” four years ago. Now it just happens to be Obama. Good grief.

Wrapping up:

“I want every single janitor in the U.S. to be an independent investor…”

It just can’t be about that. It has to be about cooperation in the economy, about shaping an economic foundation for communities. We must move past the negative liberty, social atomization model. More wealth per person is not even remotely my ultimate goal or that of the Church. Economic justice will result in that, but in so much more as well.

Finally, it is true that I am more specific than the Church has been. There are gaps that need filling in. But I like to think that what I have done is develop and not revise the main idea.

Whew! That was fun. I look froward to your reply.

Joe, I'm sorry; I have three customers asking me to make changes to their websites yesterday and I have got to get that work completed.

Ergo, I won't be able to respond fully.

However, I'm most interested in the whole "source of value/wealth" thing, because if we fundamentally agreed on that, a lot else would likely follow.

I still haven't seen you give an argument that persuades me that labor per se is the source of value.

I mean, look at natural resources such as land and water, or even a nice view. No labor has gone into them yet, but they are not completely without value, even though they're usually fairly low in value until someone contributes the labor needed to make them more valuable.

It seems to me that your "labor is the source of value" thesis would, extended to its logical conclusions, require that all the following statements be literally true:

1. Anything into which there has been zero labor input would sell for zero dollars, even if it is naturally beautiful or useful;

2. Any service (which is pure labor) will sell for something, even if it is for a very low price, because it has labor in it;

3. The same thing should sell for two different prices when it is produced through two different quantities of labor by the same person (e.g. if two identical carvings are made by whittling blocks of wood, but one of the blocks was larger initially and required more whittling, they should sell for different prices because more labor was put into one, than the other);

4. A week's supply of baloney sandwiches should sell for the same percentage of a man's paycheck in the U.S., and in Ethiopia during a famine.

5. Neither party is better off after they make a voluntary trade with one another; or else, one is better off, and the other is worse off and has been taken advantage of.

All of which is nonsense of course. But they all seem to be directly consequent to the statement that "labor is the source of value."

Meanwhile, if we take the view that the value of the item or service originates in the needs or desires of others to obtain it, then all these logical contradictions go away:

1. A bit of land or lump of rock has value to me and I'm willing to purchase it at a given price because I plan on doing something with it: It has value, then, even before I do whatever it is I'm going to do, that is, before any labor input;

2. I'm not willing to pay you to sit and pick your nose, nor am I willing to pay you twice as much to sit and pick your nose for twice as long, because, however much effort it requires on your part, it's of zero value to me;

3. I'll buy the two carvings for exactly the same price because they're exactly the same, even if one took more carving-time to get it that way;

4. Starving Ethiopians will gladly pay a larger percentage of the fruits of their daily labor than fat Americans for the baloney sandwiches, because they need them more;

5. Both parties to a trade come away better off than they were before the trade (provided it wasn't forced and there was no fraud involved) because they each now have the thing they wanted more and have given away the thing they wanted less; were this not true, voluntary trade would never occur.

In all those examples, the view that the desire for the service or good is the source of its value is directly congruent with reality and internally consistent with itself.

...continued...

...continued...

Furthermore, there is a symmetry between the notion that value comes from desire, and the notion that our eternal value comes from God, together with the corollary that men themselves cannot be rightfully bought and sold by men, even though a man may sell his labor, or broker the sale of that labor through a third party:

Person P, who has no immediate need, nevertheless decides to buy Item X and Service Y, because he thinks his lot is improved thereby. In making and acting on that decision, he expresses his free will and creativity, thereby living out those portions of the gift of God at creation we call "being made in God's likeness." By deciding how much he is willing to pay for Item X and Service Y, he ascribes his own idea of value to them, declaring them to have those values.

God G, who has no needs immediate or otherwise, decides to make and redeem Person P, because He decides that His Creation is improved thereby. In making and acting on that decision, He expresses the Free Will and Creativity of which human free will and creativity are mere adumbrated reflections. By deciding that He is willing to pay (in this case, Himself) for them, He ascribes His idea of Value to Person P, declaring Person P to have that value.

In man, desire often comes from need, or even from a mistaken understanding of need, but not always, and in the U.S., not usually. (Ethiopia during a famine is a different matter!)

Yet purchasing decisions are still made, because desire exists. And when desire is acted upon is is an expression of free will (for good or ill) and creativity (for when we act freely, what we make of our lives and ourselves and our world is bears the artistic imprint of our soul, for good or ill): We are "wielding our little tridents" as God bade us (though not always in the ways God bade us wield them).

It seems perfectly reasonable, theologically, that in exercising a part of ourselves which is part of that reduced, watered-down, or as C.S.Lewis says "transposed" way that we're Images of God, the effects of so doing would have effects similar (tho' reduced, watered-down, and transposed) to those God Himself has when He does buys something. What we buy, we ascribe value to; what He buys, He ascribes value to. The adumbration of this power in us is shown in that others can disagree with the value we ascribe, requiring that averaging or compromise which produces the notion of "market value." God has no equals, and can pay a price no other can pay; His stamp of value is therefore not qualified.

Still: In the trade, or in the desire of trade, Person P has granted Item X or Service Y as stamp of value. And why not?

This leads me to another point. Elsewhere, you write as if a man's salary was a measure of the value of the man, rather than a measure of the value of his labor. The two are utterly different, unless one subscribes to a reductionist or materialist view of what a man actually is...and though I suspect that 99% of the socialist or communist writers in history probably do subscribe to that view, and even call it a "scientific view" of labor, I know you don't subscribe to it, as a Catholic.

I can buy labor from a man at the price it's worth to me, even if that price is low, without thereby ascribing a low value to the man. I show this in the fact that I may simultaneously be putting that man through college (as my grandfather did for some young poor black kids in his town, whom he also employed, when he could, for small chores). The price of the labor may be low: But the act of giving the kids a college education into the bargain shows what value he ascribed to these human beings.

Anyhow, that's all I have time for right now; gotta go.

But please look at that "labor is the source of value" thing, and if you can express that in some different way that changes my understanding of what you mean by it, I might be able to agree. But if what you mean is what I think you mean, I never will.

Sincerely,

R.C.

RC,

“I still haven't seen you give an argument that persuades me that labor per se is the source of value.”

As I also sought to make clear previously, labor does not need to be the only source of value to be a source.

Did you read Locke’s argument? Because mine isn’t that much different. Labor takes things that are essentially worthless and makes them into useful objects. In a civilized society that includes land and water. We don’t go to the river to drink, we turn on the tap. We don’t get our food off the trees, we go to the store. Taps and stores and everything related are the products of labor.

If we do go to the river or to the trees, that doesn’t mean that they have value; in a “state of nature”, to stick with Lockean parlance, being freely accessed by all, these things have no value, they are as economically worthless as the air we breathe. It is only at a certain level of civilization, when we are several times removed from nature, that any of these things acquire value.

Now you could try to seize the air and charge people for it. That wouldn’t reflect the value of air - only your arbitrary will. But if the only way we could breathe was to set up an elaborate system of machines to purify the air, then it would have a value, because it would require labor to make it useable.

“I mean, look at natural resources such as land and water, or even a nice view. No labor has gone into them yet, but they are not completely without value, even though they're usually fairly low in value until someone contributes the labor needed to make them more valuable.”

Ok, even if I were to go along with “fairly low”, the point is that the increase in value would be the result of the labor, and rightfully belong, partially or fully, to the laborers who increased it. That is the point here. Labor creates a just claim to property. When the property takes the form of profits, labor has a just claim to profits. Regardless of whether or not labor alone is the only source of value, if it is evident that there can be no profits without labor for the production of 99.9% of the things we buy and consume, then it is beyond doubt that labor is entitled to the profits on the theory that we have a right to the fruits of our labor. On some other theory of property, perhaps not.

“1. Anything into which there has been zero labor input would sell for zero dollars, even if it is naturally beautiful or useful;”

Such as what? Pretty rocks? They’re everywhere. They should sell for zero dollars. Diamonds are far more worthless than we imagine, and are only expensive because millions of them are stored in a vault in the Netherlands. What useful thing in nature are you speaking of? Fire? Did someone put a price on fire? I could go back to air as well…

“2. Any service (which is pure labor) will sell for something, even if it is for a very low price, because it has labor in it;”

A service isn’t really a product, and this goes back to my critique of the American economy. Services don’t create wealth. They move it around. They are absolutely necessary but also non-productive. That isn’t a bad word or a word intended to strip services of all importance. It’s just the way it is.

“3. The same thing should sell for two different prices when it is produced through two different quantities of labor by the same person (e.g. if two identical carvings are made by whittling blocks of wood, but one of the blocks was larger initially and required more whittling, they should sell for different prices because more labor was put into one, than the other);”

That may in fact be the exact case. Why wouldn’t the larger block of wood sell for more, if it require more effort? Why wouldn’t the craftsman say to the potential buyer, “this one costs more because it cost me more in terms of raw materials, time and effort?” How is that “nonsense”?

Of course we are again with this example outside of modern production, where technology reduces most of our labor to an undifferentiated, abstract mass. The labor theory of value also explains why the block of wood carved by hand by a craftsman in the course of a day costs more than the block of wood churned out of a factory in under a minute. Machinery serves one purpose in production, and that is to enhance (or even eliminate the need for altogether) the productivity of human labor.

Presumably people desire things like wood carvings today as much as they did 1000 years ago. But they pay less for them today because they cost so little produce by a machine (unless they are particularly looking to pay more for the handmade work, which plenty of people are at trinket shops across the country).

Over vast differences of time, the desire theory of value breaks down and ceases to explain anything. I don’t deny that the balance of supply and demand determines the immediate price. But on a historical scale, things become more valuable or more worthless when the productivity of the labor required to produce them rises or drops.

“4. A week's supply of baloney sandwiches should sell for the same percentage of a man's paycheck in the U.S., and in Ethiopia during a famine.”

The point of the labor theory of value is not to determine the rate at which things exchange for another, but to determine the share that labor has in the product of the whole production process. Just because conditions in Ethiopia drive up the price of baloney 1000% doesn’t mean that real value wasn’t created by labor during the process of the baloney’s production. Production and exchange are two different things.

“5. Neither party is better off after they make a voluntary trade with one another; or else, one is better off, and the other is worse off and has been taken advantage of.”

In terms of exchange value, no, they aren’t. Trade does not increase wealth. In terms of personal utility, we would hope that they are, but these are again two different things.

When it comes to the “trade” of labor for wages, one party is always worse off - the laborer. Wages always reflect the market price of labor, but never the value that labor creates in the process of production.

That is why justice depends on a mass exodus from the labor market and into direct ownership of the means of production.


“Meanwhile, if we take the view that the value of the item or service originates in the needs or desires of others to obtain it, then all these logical contradictions go away”

We’ll see :)

“1. A bit of land or lump of rock has value to me and I'm willing to purchase it at a given price because I plan on doing something with it: It has value, then, even before I do whatever it is I'm going to do, that is, before any labor input;”

But what value? Lets think about this realistically. The fact that you are even willing to purchase a lump of rock presupposes that you can’t get it for yourself, for free, from Mother Earth. That means you are paying someone to get it for you. What he will be willing to sell it to you for, will, if the man is rational, have to reflect the effort he expended to get it and any costs he incurred.

Your desire imparts nothing to the rock. At best our collective desires studied over time serve as parameters, but not determinants, of the real value of things.

“2. I'm not willing to pay you to sit and pick your nose, nor am I willing to pay you twice as much to sit and pick your nose for twice as long, because, however much effort it requires on your part, it's of zero value to me;”

Well, if you valued boogers as much as you valued the rock, you just might.

“3. I'll buy the two carvings for exactly the same price because they're exactly the same, even if one took more carving-time to get it that way;”

But they aren’t exactly the same! One of the blocks was initially larger, they are not identical. Any producer would be well within reason to insist that you pay more for the one that cost more to produce. You may want to buy them at the same price, but that doesn’t mean you can.

In the real world where we buy things that are produced in factories according to a predetermined plan, every wood carving will cost the same. This is the world we live in, a world where people who do all of the work are told they have no right to any of the profits because some intangible thing like “decisions” or “risk” created them. Really it is only because as wage laborers they are nothing but inputs and items in the “costs” column, not partners, not owners, not human beings.

If that sounds melodramatic for the United States, it is only because earlier generations fought and bled and in some cases died for basic workers rights, rights which many take for granted and which many on the right would like to see obliterated forever. To return to your example, regardless of the price at which you buy them, it is the wood carver and not some distant investor or CEO that is going to take what you pay him. He will directly appropriate from you the value of the thing he has created. For the people working in sweatshops making little plastic toys for American children, there is nothing but a pittance barely fit for animals.

The conditions of production in other words, the historical conditions, are what set the stage for the value of the wood carving.

“4. Starving Ethiopians will gladly pay a larger percentage of the fruits of their daily labor than fat Americans for the baloney sandwiches, because they need them more;”

Acknowledged, but it is irrelevant. That is only to say that they will pay more than the baloney is worth because they need it more!

“5. Both parties to a trade come away better off than they were before the trade (provided it wasn't forced and there was no fraud involved) because they each now have the thing they wanted more and have given away the thing they wanted less; were this not true, voluntary trade would never occur.”

Yes, better of in terms of personal utility. You may even be sitting on knowledge that will allow you to buy something cheaply from one guy and sell it to another for much more. But assuming normal market conditions, like, when I pay you 5 dollars for something in your store, we’ve only exchanged equivalents.

On to the other stuff.

“Furthermore, there is a symmetry between the notion that value comes from desire, and the notion that our eternal value comes from God, together with the corollary that men themselves cannot be rightfully bought and sold by men, even though a man may sell his labor, or broker the sale of that labor through a third party:

Person P, who has no immediate need, nevertheless decides to buy Item X and Service Y, because he thinks his lot is improved thereby. In making and acting on that decision, he expresses his free will and creativity, thereby living out those portions of the gift of God at creation we call "being made in God's likeness." By deciding how much he is willing to pay for Item X and Service Y, he ascribes his own idea of value to them, declaring them to have those values.”

Well this is all very interesting, but what does it have to do with economics? By deciding how much you are willing to pay for something, you only presume that you are in a position to bargain. You don’t do that when you go into any store in the country. You might do it at a swap meet, but not if you are at a booth, say of a wood carver, where the people are selling things they have made themselves; they will have to cover their costs at least or go out of business.

It is of course irrelevant when we are talking about your wood carver. He works for himself. I wouldn’t even call that capitalism. It’s just simple barter. His trinkets for your shiny coins. The question of what part of the production process creates what part of the profits is irrelevant since it all goes to one person, or one family, or one person and a few apprentices who are paying for the privilege of an education - “paying their dues” you might say.

But in economies of scale, the question is all important because the vast disparities in wealth do not reflect vast disparities in effort, but rather vast disparities in both bargaining power and ownership. This is the injustice. The workers are not paying their dues, but are denied the fruits of their labor because they lack the bargaining power to secure them and the ownership to legally entitle them.

I will return to the main point of the last post: the existence of profits presupposes the performance of useful, value-creating labor, which presupposes the existence of laborers who by their very activity have a just claim to those profits. Even if you had me dead to rights on the value of water and rocks in nature, it wouldn’t change the validity of this proposition.

“Still: In the trade, or in the desire of trade, Person P has granted Item X or Service Y as stamp of value. And why not?”

A blank stamp, until the conditions and costs of production are taken into account…

“This leads me to another point. Elsewhere, you write as if a man's salary was a measure of the value of the man, rather than a measure of the value of his labor.”

I have done no such thing. I have gone out of my way, over and over again, to point out that a man’s salary reflects nothing other than the price of his labor on the labor market, not the actual product of his labor, and to further say that this is the heart of the problem!

“The two are utterly different, unless one subscribes to a reductionist or materialist view of what a man actually is...and though I suspect that 99% of the socialist or communist writers in history probably do subscribe to that view, and even call it a "scientific view" of labor, I know you don't subscribe to it, as a Catholic.”

Well, communists don’t do that, to be honest with you. No one does that. No one says that a person’s salary is what they are worth as a human being. I don’t think you could provide a quote from me, or anyone else, ever arguing such a thing.

I have to say, reading this again, why is the burden of proof on me here?

You are the one who seems to be insisting that your desire alone imparts values to my boogers, to go back to your nose picking scenario. You wouldn't pay for them, so they have no value? What if there is a thriving booger market? What if there could be? Your lack of desire means nothing. You don't have to pay for them in order for them to be worth something.

Aren't you the one who needs to put things differently?

Please people why do you argue over taxes. Taxes are used by every country in the world to repay the loans that they take out to carry out their wishes not the Peoples. This is fact. If you want to pay taxes that is fine. The first question I ask is, "How much do you want to pay??????? Do you want to pay more or less than the rich man or the poor man. The next question you have to ask is, "Why are taxes having to be paid?" They are having to be paid because of a fault in the Monetary system used throughout the World in every country using a Usuary Money System. Which is every single one of them. It is just that some pay more than other countries that is all but they all pay. Why? Because all countries are in debt. All countries are in debt to the same identity. The world Banking system originating within the walls of the Vatican City and the City of London. Both these a seperate State of their own identity. They have their own laws even and not England or Italy has any juristiction over them. "He who controls the credit of a nation directs the Policy of government and holds in the palm of his hand the destiny of EVERYONE within it."(Reginald McKenna, Chancellor of the Exchequer, England in the 1930s. Usuary is condemned in nearly all religions Christian, Moslem etc. All the Ism faiths uphold it, Communism,Socialism, Facism, Zionism, Catholism. Notice I did not include Judaism because this is a name that has been taken over by an identity to cover there agenda namely Zionism. Read the Ten Statements of the Communist Manifesto. I do not want to live by this manifesto but I am being controlled by it in every country in the world. Worst of all America. Just being able to elect your own dictator in a Democracy is not actually Democracy is it.
I say I don't want to pay any taxes at all. It can be done easily. It was done in America and it is what made America so rich until in 1913 the Government was so tricked into finally dropping it President Woodrow Wilson apologised to the country in his final words before dying. That country is now the most indebted country in the world today.