Dr. Mattson, I’ve been reading you for quite a while. I’ve read a fair amount of your writing. I can’t decide if this or ‘The Magnificent Pig’ is better, but I feel fairly confident in saying they are two of the best things you’ve written. Spectacular.
It's depressing to see protestants tear down the fruit of the protestant revolution in economics.
There is nothing in the Law about the King inserting himself into the market. In fact, the number of the Beast is exactly the King inserting himself into the market-controlling buying and selling.
There is a reason that economics are laissez faire in the Bible. God wants the people's desires to be their teacher.
If Peter had gotten his way, he'd have denied the Hebrews the covies of quail in the wilderness, because he thinks you can train goodness into men through tweaking their transactions.
Social engineering, basically.
God thought otherwise, and gave them the food they craved until it came out their nostrils.
The only market intervention approved in the Bible is smashing the sale of man flesh; and that isn't because of the sale per se but because of the kidnapping. The downstream buyers and sellers participate vicariously in that, and thus get death along with the original kidnapper.
Markets are always downstream of culture. If we baptized men and teach them to obey everything Christ commanded, we get heathy markets.
If we allow the King to tinker with the markets to make men good, we get just another version of the algorithms designed to mold men's desires in social media.
Except I trust the King's instincts even less than TikTok.
Here's a Mises quote that should tie Peter's thesis into knots:
"Ownership of the means of production is not a privilege, but a social liability. Capitalists and landowners are compelled to employ their property for the best possible satisfaction of the consumers. If they are slow and inept in the performance of their duties, they are penalized by losses. If they do not learn the lesson and do not reform their conduct of affairs, they lose their wealth. No investment is safe forever. He who does not use his property in serving the consumers in the most efficient way is doomed to failure. There is no room left for people who would like to enjoy their fortunes in idleness and thoughtlessness." -- Ludwig von Mises, Human Action
"You won't be on those committees" really is the mike-drop.
Furthermore, Jesus set the satchel charge under communitarian or postliberal ideas of love with this little mike-drop: "love your neighbor as you love yourself".
One could not dream up a more Misesian statement. Jesus actually assumes that the individual actor's self-love is the standard by which to act out all ethics in the acted-out world.
It's particularly bizarre for someone who has made his career combating homosexual marriage, to defend Trump: who has zero desire, inclination, or intent to come within 1,000 miles of touching current homosexual marriage laws.
This really inadvertently displays Trump's wicked genius: flap his gums for 3 seconds about something evangelicals care about, so he can get them onboard for a vote, then proceed immediately to dump their agenda into the round file, then distract them with more gum-flapping about some culture war issue.
Really strange how silent evangelicals have become about homosexual marriage, now that they are rabidly defending Trump's toughness on all those countries ripping us off, like Singapore.
I think this is an excellent piece, Brian. Thank you. Of course, individual freedom is a basic good without being a cure all to man's sin. "Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others." (Philippians 2:4) You, of course, weren't saying that it was. Good laws are often needed to restrain the sin of man and you would say, I think, that the classical liberal order is the closest we have come so far in a proper balance between individual self-interest and laws of society.
Great comments, Reep. Thanks. Yes, I will never wrap my head around people evaluating the only economic system in which you benefit ONLY by serving your fellow man (better than the next guy) and thinking, “Greed.”
Dr. Mattson, I’ve been reading you for quite a while. I’ve read a fair amount of your writing. I can’t decide if this or ‘The Magnificent Pig’ is better, but I feel fairly confident in saying they are two of the best things you’ve written. Spectacular.
Very, very kind. Thank you!
It's depressing to see protestants tear down the fruit of the protestant revolution in economics.
There is nothing in the Law about the King inserting himself into the market. In fact, the number of the Beast is exactly the King inserting himself into the market-controlling buying and selling.
There is a reason that economics are laissez faire in the Bible. God wants the people's desires to be their teacher.
If Peter had gotten his way, he'd have denied the Hebrews the covies of quail in the wilderness, because he thinks you can train goodness into men through tweaking their transactions.
Social engineering, basically.
God thought otherwise, and gave them the food they craved until it came out their nostrils.
The only market intervention approved in the Bible is smashing the sale of man flesh; and that isn't because of the sale per se but because of the kidnapping. The downstream buyers and sellers participate vicariously in that, and thus get death along with the original kidnapper.
Markets are always downstream of culture. If we baptized men and teach them to obey everything Christ commanded, we get heathy markets.
If we allow the King to tinker with the markets to make men good, we get just another version of the algorithms designed to mold men's desires in social media.
Except I trust the King's instincts even less than TikTok.
Here's a Mises quote that should tie Peter's thesis into knots:
"Ownership of the means of production is not a privilege, but a social liability. Capitalists and landowners are compelled to employ their property for the best possible satisfaction of the consumers. If they are slow and inept in the performance of their duties, they are penalized by losses. If they do not learn the lesson and do not reform their conduct of affairs, they lose their wealth. No investment is safe forever. He who does not use his property in serving the consumers in the most efficient way is doomed to failure. There is no room left for people who would like to enjoy their fortunes in idleness and thoughtlessness." -- Ludwig von Mises, Human Action
"You won't be on those committees" really is the mike-drop.
Furthermore, Jesus set the satchel charge under communitarian or postliberal ideas of love with this little mike-drop: "love your neighbor as you love yourself".
One could not dream up a more Misesian statement. Jesus actually assumes that the individual actor's self-love is the standard by which to act out all ethics in the acted-out world.
It's particularly bizarre for someone who has made his career combating homosexual marriage, to defend Trump: who has zero desire, inclination, or intent to come within 1,000 miles of touching current homosexual marriage laws.
This really inadvertently displays Trump's wicked genius: flap his gums for 3 seconds about something evangelicals care about, so he can get them onboard for a vote, then proceed immediately to dump their agenda into the round file, then distract them with more gum-flapping about some culture war issue.
Really strange how silent evangelicals have become about homosexual marriage, now that they are rabidly defending Trump's toughness on all those countries ripping us off, like Singapore.
This is really fantastic. Thank you for articulating so clearly and persuasively what many like me can only feel and grunt at. Will be sharing!
I think this is an excellent piece, Brian. Thank you. Of course, individual freedom is a basic good without being a cure all to man's sin. "Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others." (Philippians 2:4) You, of course, weren't saying that it was. Good laws are often needed to restrain the sin of man and you would say, I think, that the classical liberal order is the closest we have come so far in a proper balance between individual self-interest and laws of society.
Thank you. Indeed! There’s always much more to say but it was already very long!
Great comments, Reep. Thanks. Yes, I will never wrap my head around people evaluating the only economic system in which you benefit ONLY by serving your fellow man (better than the next guy) and thinking, “Greed.”