Development of People & Government

[joshrp]

Hi,

I’ve been getting frustrated with a lot of people’s ideas on social justice, particularly in the area of economics. Most people just reduce it to a false dichotomy of how much stuff a person gets, and whether their basic physical and material needs for sustenance are met. People often divide it into say conservative or liberal or capitalist or socialist. And I think this is just stupid. All both sides seem to care about is whether people are getting “stuff”, who owns it, who controls it, who produces it, who eats it or uses it, who pays for it, who taxes it and how much, etc. What should be really discussed is what Paul VI promoted in his encyclical Populorem Progressio as the development of people. This should be the topic discussed: how do we develop all people to the fullness of their mental, spiritual, and physical capabilities, however that expresses itself for each individual? I’m tired of people whose only political concern is saving babies in danger of abortion and then they don’t really care or do anything for the development of the people being born. I am particularly critical of the idea that the government cannot play any role in the economy in promoting people’s general welfare. First of all, the American constitution says explicitly that the Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes. I’m startled how many people who call themselves Christian refer to Ayn Rand, who is one of the most antichristian figures in history I have ever read. The US Constitution talks about the promotion of the general welfare and that any and all necessary and proper laws to provide for this shall be allowed the government. I compare this to the Catholic and Christian notion of the promotion of the common good. But most Catholics I know do not even have any clear concept of what the general welfare or the common good is. Most people just think of “the welfare of my circle of people” or “the good of my social and economic and spiritual network”.

The bottom line is not property or money. The bottom line is a person’s mental and especially spiritual development. Pope Paul VI says in Populorem Progressio something along the lines of, Are you people willing to pay more taxes so that people are able to get educated and participate fully in contributing to society. That is not verbatim, but I suggest you find the actual encyclical on www.vatican.va or www.papalencyclicals.net and find the actual quote. For something more American, I suggest Alexander Hamilton’s Report to the Congress on the Subject of Manufactures, which you can find for free online.

Government plays a role in the development of peoples. It creates the credit which is used to invest in projects that bring the economy to a higher level of development. It invests in scientific discoveries and infrastructure that increase the productive powers of labor as Hamilton says. And as far as your money goes, money is a tool and monopoly of government Credit system that can be regulated by government to encourage productive and beneficial practices and discourage nonproductive parasitical practices like speculation and gambling. Most of the money that is made today is done by vulture currency speculators and investment banks. I’m really upset and angered at all the people who are attacking programs like Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security but say nothing about the multitrillion dollar bailouts of huge investment banks which do nothing but gamble and then ask the taxpayers to bail them out when there stupid bets fail.

I have more I can say but I will hopefully be able to discuss it in dialogue with you all. I just think that most people have their priorities totally warped when it comes to economic justice. It is not about equality of income, that is not what I am saying. But it is about people being able to have the ability to do what God wants them to do. I think education is the most important thing in this, and we as a whole do not value the development of the minds of all young people, especially children. Also, the pro-life movement should focus on the right to a human beings full creative development, which is the purpose of life. God is the big Creator, we are like His little creators. We assist in His work of creative development of the universe. We are the only creatures of His who can actually understand and apply the principles by which He made everything that exists. “And He made them in His own image and likeness. Male and female He created them. And He commanded them to increase and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the creatures of the air and land and sea. etc” (don’t know how accurate that is, just quoting off the top of my head)

Joshua

 

[St_Francis]

Part of the problem is that there is a difference in underlying philosophy. I just found out this week about an economic theory called chartalism or Modern Monetary Theory, which believes that government is the source of money. You exemplified that in your post when you wrote that the government funds research… If you look at great inventions, they were outside of the government-funding loop for the most part: light bulbs, PCs, etc.

This country is in a terrible mess fiscally. The government is in a lot of debt, a huge amount of which was borrowed and spent to encourage an economic recovery which has not yet occurred, but for which we need to pay.

Conservatives do not believe in that monetary theory, and I believe it has been pretty much totally disproven. Conservatives focus more on the principle of subsidiarity,*(see next post) which holds that problems should be under the authority and responsibility of the smallest social unit possible. They believe that there should be more private charity and less federal handing-out. And they put their money where their mouth is: conservatives give more to charity, donate more blood, and volunteer at higher rates than do liberals.

There is a tension… both the liberals and conservatives can go too far in their respective directions. Liberals can move into an overly-controlling semi-socialism, and conservatives can go over to “rugges individualism” which is more Protestant than Catholic.

Try not to let one group of people inform you on both sides, just as non-Catholics should not get their information about the Catholic Church from atheist or Protestant sources, so should we not get our information about one political side or another solely from one source. Few conservatives want to do away with social safety nets altogether, they want them to be more beneficial, less costly (only 27% of monies directed towards welfare programs directly helps poor people, most is eaten away in administation costs), and more locally administered. And conservatives are currently very concerned about a debt which cpuld crush us, our children, and our grandchildren, and make it impossible for us to help anyone at all.

 

[St_Francis]

Just wanted to add that conservatives believe that money is something made to facilitate the exchange of goods and services, and merely represents value. Value itself is created by people working, not by the government.

 

[Captain_America]

Joshua: good post. I consider myself an economic progressive and social conservative.

I, too, am dismayed by how many people adore the libertarian fantasy and are under its spell.

Actually, what the libertarians have going for them is the trend of deregulation; big corporations are pumping money into propaganda. . . and I don’t think the average citizen benefits when big corporations have their way with the world.

The upside is that the idea of personal responsibility has made a comeback. That’s a very good thing.

This morning I was realizing that one big reason the emphasis is on Money=social status=happiness thing is that money is measurable: you can tell what kind of house and car a man has. That man may be deeply damaged and horribly unhappy. . . but there is no concrete sign or indicator that tells us how happy a person is: consider what life would be like if you went grocery shopping, and could tell, simply by looking, whether a person was genuinely happy, on a scale of 1-100.

 

[GratefulFred]

Good post, Joshua. Life is not about who has how much, who controls what. Life is about knowing and loving God and loving others for the love of God.

The question is HOW SHOULD we love others? The Catholic Church is correct to teach it is about developing ourselves and also developing others.

We have a duty to develop people, our own family first, then our community, and others we can reach. BUT people also have to want to be developed.

We damage people’s sense of self worth when we keep them dependent on government handouts. An old saying, “An honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay.”

We damage their sense of self worth when we fail to ensure thay they receive a proper education. America has a 25% to 30% high school dropout rate; higher in some social groups. An unmeasured number of high school graduates cannot read, write, or do math well enough to get beyond a series of minimum wage jobs.

We have drug wars in Mexico to feed the out of control drug appetite in America.

Too few of our political and social leaders and educators promote the 4 cardinal vitures, PRUDENCE, TEMPERANCE, FORTITUDE, and JUSTICE. Too few teach the value of HONOR and INTEGRITY. They seem to be too busy trying to get and expand control and fatten their personal incomes.

Too many have forgotten how to love the way God would have us love one another. A strong sense of selfishness is the opposite of love.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Good post, Joshua. Life is not about who has how much, who controls what. Life is about knowing and loving God and loving others for the love of God.

The question is HOW SHOULD we love others? The Catholic Church is correct to teach it is about developing ourselves and also developing others.

We have a duty to develop people, our own family first, then our community, and others we can reach. BUT people also have to want to be developed.

We damage people’s sense of self worth when we keep them dependent on government handouts. An old saying, “An honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay.”

We damage their sense of self worth when we fail to ensure thay they receive a proper education. America has a 25% to 30% high school dropout rate; higher in some social groups. An unmeasured number of high school graduates cannot read, write, or do math well enough to get beyond a series of minimum wage jobs.

We have drug wars in Mexico to feed the out of control drug appetite in America.

Too few of our political and social leaders and educators promote the 4 cardinal vitures, PRUDENCE, TEMPERANCE, FORTITUDE, and JUSTICE. Too few teach the value of HONOR and INTEGRITY. They seem to be too busy trying to get and expand control and fatten their personal incomes.

Too many have forgotten how to love the way God would have us love one another. A strong sense of selfishness is the opposite of love.

I agree.

I will also say that the OP has so many things in his post that it’s hard to pick them out to deal with.

I would be described by most as conservative. But I’m definitely not an Ayn Rand fan. I think her “Atlas Shrugged” for instance, is a wonderful story idea, poorly told and tainted by a nasty philosophy. Her characters are such wooden Indians, they belong in front of cigar stores.

At one time I was a dedicated Democrat. Held party office, in fact. I had to draw back from it when it dedicated itself to abortion, and the separation has widened since, because it keeps getting more and more radical.

On the other hand, some would say I’m even more liberal than Obama. I believe in government aid to the truly poor, while he doesn’t even propose anything for them, let alone do anything for them. He’s all middle class welfare and corporate welfare.

Our birth rate is declining. Among native-born it’s below replacement rate. In Western Europe, it’s massively worse. Why is that? Well, it probably is due to a number of things, but one can observe that one’s production (or wage) goes to two things; personal consumption and transfers to others. Personal consumption can be, and often is, excessive, but really, in Europe personal consumption is no higher than here for the most part, and is even less in most places. So, they should have a lot left over for transfer to the most natural objects of their surplus transfers; spouse, children, grandchildren, then to Church and the needy whose situation we really know.

But they don’t, because the government makes those transfers for them, and largely to other people whose circumstances are hardly different from their own. Take away my money and give it to some other middle class person, and I have less left over to transfer to my children or grandchildren who might be in greater need that the person who got my money.

It’s an unnatural way to do things and, in my opinion, has unnatural results…results that will eventually be catastrophic.

One might reflect on the Good Samaritan for a moment. Lots of people cite that parable. The Good Samaritan actually saw the injured traveler. He was right there. Did that traveler have a greater claim on the Samaritan’s charity than some guy in Syria about whom he knew nothing at all? Of course he did. But did the Good Samaritan split his entire wealth with the traveler? No he didn’t. He gave him physical aid, paid his hotel bill and two coins. That was the limit of his perciptible need. From then on, the injured traveler was on his own. And Jesus cited him as a proper example.

We have all been sold on the idea that giving ever more of our transferrable wealth to the government is somehow a moral imperative. But is it, when the governing people buy votes and campaign contributions with it and absolutely ignores the truly poor? I say not.

I have been outraged for years over the situation of the disabled needy who were never able to work or didn’t work long enough for SSD; those on SSI. SSI pays about $600/month and you have to be absolutely without assets to get even that. Did any stimulus money go to them? No, not a farthing. But a lot did go to middle class people in education, in unions and in government jobs. Obamacare itself is a middle class welfare program wherein a family of four making $88,000/year will be subsidized by taxpayers, when most of them had employer-based health insurance to begin with. Middle class welfare.

Warren Buffett is a multi-billionaire, yet he qualifies for both Social Security and Medicare simply because he’s old. He’s so wealthy he doesn’t even need health insurance of any kind. He could pay his own way. Middle class welfare.

And why are the truly poor ignored while government pours trillions into middle class pockets and corporate pockets? Because the middle class votes and the poor don’t, and because corporate friends contribute to campaign coffers. There’s no charity to it at all.

No, I’m not buying into the conventional “wisdom”…not anybody’s. I’ll remain a “some ways conservative, some ways liberal”.

 

[valentino]

Hi,

I’ve been getting frustrated with a lot of people’s ideas on social justice, particularly in the area of economics. Most people just reduce it to a false dichotomy of how much stuff a person gets, and whether their basic physical and material needs for sustenance are met. People often divide it into say conservative or liberal or capitalist or socialist. And I think this is just stupid. All both sides seem to care about is whether people are getting “stuff”, who owns it, who controls it, who produces it, who eats it or uses it, who pays for it, who taxes it and how much, etc. What should be really discussed is what Paul VI promoted in his encyclical Populorem Progressio as the development of people. This should be the topic discussed: how do we develop all people to the fullness of their mental, spiritual, and physical capabilities, however that expresses itself for each individual? I’m tired of people whose only political concern is saving babies in danger of abortion and then they don’t really care or do anything for the development of the people being born. I am particularly critical of the idea that the government cannot play any role in the economy in promoting people’s general welfare. First of all, the American constitution says explicitly that the Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes. I’m startled how many people who call themselves Christian refer to Ayn Rand, who is one of the most antichristian figures in history I have ever read. The US Constitution talks about the promotion of the general welfare and that any and all necessary and proper laws to provide for this shall be allowed the government. I compare this to the Catholic and Christian notion of the promotion of the common good. But most Catholics I know do not even have any clear concept of what the general welfare or the common good is. Most people just think of “the welfare of my circle of people” or “the good of my social and economic and spiritual network”.

The bottom line is not property or money. The bottom line is a person’s mental and especially spiritual development. Pope Paul VI says in Populorem Progressio something along the lines of, Are you people willing to pay more taxes so that people are able to get educated and participate fully in contributing to society. That is not verbatim, but I suggest you find the actual encyclical on www.vatican.va or www.papalencyclicals.net and find the actual quote. For something more American, I suggest Alexander Hamilton’s Report to the Congress on the Subject of Manufactures, which you can find for free online.

Government plays a role in the development of peoples. It creates the credit which is used to invest in projects that bring the economy to a higher level of development. It invests in scientific discoveries and infrastructure that increase the productive powers of labor as Hamilton says. And as far as your money goes, money is a tool and monopoly of government Credit system that can be regulated by government to encourage productive and beneficial practices and discourage nonproductive parasitical practices like speculation and gambling. Most of the money that is made today is done by vulture currency speculators and investment banks. I’m really upset and angered at all the people who are attacking programs like Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security but say nothing about the multitrillion dollar bailouts of huge investment banks which do nothing but gamble and then ask the taxpayers to bail them out when there stupid bets fail.

I have more I can say but I will hopefully be able to discuss it in dialogue with you all. I just think that most people have their priorities totally warped when it comes to economic justice. It is not about equality of income, that is not what I am saying. But it is about people being able to have the ability to do what God wants them to do. I think education is the most important thing in this, and we as a whole do not value the development of the minds of all young people, especially children. Also, the pro-life movement should focus on the right to a human beings full creative development, which is the purpose of life. God is the big Creator, we are like His little creators. We assist in His work of creative development of the universe. We are the only creatures of His who can actually understand and apply the principles by which He made everything that exists. “And He made them in His own image and likeness. Male and female He created them. And He commanded them to increase and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the creatures of the air and land and sea. etc” (don’t know how accurate that is, just quoting off the top of my head)

Joshua

Governments don’t create the credit.Banks dnly the Federal Reserve is a government backed bank.When does the government spend too much on research and infrastructure?I think there has been quite a bit about the bailouts and the government has gotten a little back but they are in such a powerful positions that government can do little about it.Our whole economy rests on the banking system.Its hard to pin anyone down or prosecute because so many people were involved.I don’t see how you can say we donn’t value the education of our children.We spend more every year on education and have been for the last 40yrs.Do you know the cost of !yr.of schooling?Even in grade school?There has never been a time in history when more students have had an easier time to go to colllege.(provided you pass the tests)

 

[PeterGStanley]

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

"Then the righteous will answer him, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?

"The King will reply, "Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

The word of the Lord!!!