Usury is Catholic

[Timothy17]

Duly noted. I was being sloppy with the terminology.

I am not sure that “man-made” is necessarily the same as “artificial”, or that “artificial” is synonymous with “bad”.

I absolutely agree in principle. For example, houses are man-made artificial constructs. They are either good or bad depending on their design, execution and ultimate use. My thesis is that the “economic house” we’ve built is flawed in design, and thus people suffer from both its execution and from its use. While this is a sad thesis, it is one that also has hope, since we certainly can or could build a better economic house.

The same is true with banking practices. Our system is not the only possible one, but it seems to be fairly effective and there would be untold problems and unintended consequences if we were to meddle with that system out of misplaced piety.

I also agree, which is why I started this thread to be a discussion about the present practice. Clearly, it appears not a little subject to relativism about qualifying the present system as being a good or a bad. I would think most of the world’s population would protest that the present system is somehow unjust or bad, however, and only a very few would argue it is a very good thing. The latter are the exception to the rule, in my opinion, and historic and present economic conditions would tend to demonstrate that there is a systemic flaw in our present economic system.

I think we are more or less in agreement. What I really object to is the sort of language (parasite, useless, blood sucking, etc) that this topic elicits from certain people. It is very dangerous

I would argue that this concern makes it all the more pressing and prudent to have these discussion here and by Catholics. We are subject to the moral laws and the rules of the Church. Catholicism has never been a root for anarchy, riot and rebellion. It does not lend itself to a two wrongs make a right mentality. And it has no stomach for violence, slander, etc. We can discuss these things civilly and make our petitions, should any general recommendations be made, peaceably.

Pax,
Tim

 

[Cambridge]

Yes, you bring up an excellent point about the problem : ceteris paribus, the price of things tend to go down as time passes owing to improvements. One previous poster mentioned that houses are much larger and more elaborate than in the 1960s, and that this is the cause of their increase in price ; however, as you noted, in normal economic conditions as improvements are made in the industry, it increases the value and utility of money, so someone should be able to purchase, for example, a larger house at the same price someone paid for a smaller one several years back. This is standard economics. It’s the same reason that laptops, televisions and desktop PCs are cheaper now than ever before, even though the product is far, far superior. Housing is no different. Granted, the land value plays an important role, but as anyone knows, the value of the land is only ever fractional to that of the house.

Clearly there is market manipulation at play in the housing industry where it is more clearly seen that the usual economic laws have not only been suspended, but entirely reversed. Technically speaking, it should be far cheaper today than ever to purchase and own a home and to pay it off quickly, as unlike in the 1960’s, both husband and wife are likely working. The time to pay off a house should have, ceteris paribus, at least halved (if contribution to principal repyayment is doubled by dual income) or, if the spouses maximize their purchasing power, remained equal but resulted in a vastly larger or superior home (in improved location and quality, we’d assume) ; however, we see the exact opposite has occured. It takes far longer than ever to pay for one’s house, it is now a generational enterprise for many people.

Pax,
Tim

It seems as if home lending standards were changed, by the federal government, in order to encourage borrowing by ordinary people. This seems to have created an artificial market for homes. A market where the price is determined by our “empowered” ability to borrow; not our ability to purchase. This seems like it would inflate prices, because it floods the market with artificially cash rich buyers. Just like school loans should inflate the price of education, by artificially inflating the number of people with huge sums of cash, ready to spend at colleges. Online education, for example, should be a lot cheaper, right? But it isn’t. How do universities get away with charging you a thousand dollars to teach you a biology class? You could read the book (which should cost about 20 dollars; not 100) and buy a frog and dissection kit at a hobby store, which probably costs around 40 dollars (gee that’s a lot of hours to work for a frog and scalpel, if you make 10 dollars an hour). It seems as if certain government regulations are actually inflating the price of education for the average person. Who benefits and who pays? Is the relationship caring or is it abusive? Don’t our leaders have a responsibility to care for us and not abuse us? Based on The Actus Caritatis it would seem that we all do. However, given our rulers special position, it would seem that they have an even greater responsibility, than ordinary people do, since they hold the reins of the state.

Actus Caritatis

 

[JackQ]

To claim that usury is evil is to admit you understand neither theology nor economics.

Probably the most central reason for our recent economic trouble has been the price of money (interest) being kept artificially low, which encouraged people to use the resource as though it were more plentiful than it really was.

If anything, it would be more moral to discourage this sort of over-consumption by charging more for money, thereby saving millions of people much trouble and heartache.

So what’s the theological reason for saying that usury isn’t evil?