WEBVTT NOTE The Myth of the Just Price 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.340 At this point what I would like to do is to, I'm proud actually, to present the 2 00:00:05.340 --> 00:00:10.400 Lew Church Memorial Lecture in Religion and Economics. Made possible by the Lew 3 00:00:10.400 --> 00:00:16.240 Church Educational Foundation, Dr. Robert D. Hemholtz, chairman, this annual 4 00:00:16.240 --> 00:00:20.200 lecture seeks to honor the late Lew Church, a Florida businessman and advocate 5 00:00:20.200 --> 00:00:25.000 of liberty, and the ideas to which he was dedicated. Starting out as a swimming 6 00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:28.840 pool cleaner, Mr. Church eventually established successful businesses in 7 00:00:28.840 --> 00:00:34.300 and Swimming Pool Construction and the Restaurant and Travel Industries. Through it all, he 8 00:00:34.300 --> 00:00:39.160 dedicated himself to the values of the free market, private property, free association, 9 00:00:39.160 --> 00:00:43.620 entrepreneurship and, of course, liberty. Realizing that big governments threaten not 10 00:00:43.620 --> 00:00:48.240 only the free enterprise system, but all that is good about America. 11 00:00:48.240 --> 00:00:55.160 Our 2008 Lew Church Memorial Lecture is Lawrence Vance. Lawrence holds degrees in history, 12 00:00:55.160 --> 00:01:01.360 Theology, Accounting and Economics. He has written and published 11 books and regularly 13 00:01:01.360 --> 00:01:07.180 contributes articles and book reviews to both secular and religious periodicals. He writes 14 00:01:07.180 --> 00:01:12.680 frequently for ludrockwell.com about the folly of Christian support for the state, its leaders, 15 00:01:12.680 --> 00:01:19.180 its military and its wars. His latest publication is a new and greatly expanded edition of Christianity 16 00:01:19.180 --> 00:01:24.680 in War and Other Essays Against the Warfare State. He is also the director of the Francis 17 00:01:24.680 --> 00:01:30.960 Francis Wayland Institute, a think-take dedicated to the ideals of Christianity, liberty, property 18 00:01:30.960 --> 00:01:36.240 and peace in the intellectual tradition of the 19th century Baptist minister Francis 19 00:01:36.240 --> 00:01:37.240 Wayland. 20 00:01:37.240 --> 00:01:50.920 So I present to you, Lawrence Vance. 21 00:01:50.920 --> 00:01:56.180 Thank you Joe for the introduction and thank you Lew Rockwell for the invitation and I 22 00:01:56.180 --> 00:02:01.880 give a special thank you to the friends and supporters of the Mises Institute for making 23 00:02:01.880 --> 00:02:06.880 the educational outreach of the Institute what it is today. 24 00:02:06.880 --> 00:02:14.600 Police protection, animal rights and Christian science, some myths never die. 25 00:02:14.600 --> 00:02:19.080 To protect and serve is now to ticket and taser. 26 00:02:19.080 --> 00:02:24.240 The only right an animal has is to be eaten, and Christian science, well, it is neither 27 00:02:24.240 --> 00:02:26.920 Christian nor scientific. 28 00:02:26.920 --> 00:02:31.720 The myth of the just price is likewise alive and well. 29 00:02:31.720 --> 00:02:38.120 The concept of the just price is the basis of a great deal of erroneous economic thought 30 00:02:38.120 --> 00:02:44.000 that permeates our supposedly free market, capitalistic society. 31 00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:52.100 Examples regarding usury, loan sharking, price gouging, ticket scalping, dumping, profiteering, 32 00:02:52.100 --> 00:02:58.740 equal pay, price discrimination, predatory pricing and lending, product bundling and 33 00:02:58.740 --> 00:03:05.460 antitrust, these are all prime examples of this fallacious way of thinking. 34 00:03:05.460 --> 00:03:11.360 Opinions expressed on these practices and things like pay for supermodels, executives, 35 00:03:11.360 --> 00:03:18.520 Actors and Athletes, as well as nebulous concepts of fairness, are likewise predicated on just 36 00:03:18.520 --> 00:03:25.520 price theory, regardless of whether the opinionist has any concept of basic economics or has 37 00:03:25.520 --> 00:03:30.240 ever even heard of just price theory. 38 00:03:30.240 --> 00:03:36.840 Regulations establishing price ceilings, price floors, a minimum wage, a living wage, a family 39 00:03:36.840 --> 00:03:44.280 Wage, Rent Control, Government Subsidies, Price Supports, and in many cases, tariffs, 40 00:03:44.280 --> 00:03:48.720 also result from the pursuit of the just price. 41 00:03:48.720 --> 00:03:54.280 The term just price is customarily disguised with a euphemism. 42 00:03:54.280 --> 00:04:01.560 So just like S-Chip, Medicare and Medicaid are never called socialized medicine, and just 43 00:04:01.560 --> 00:04:08.440 Just like refundable tax credits are never referred to as income transfer programs, attempts 44 00:04:08.440 --> 00:04:15.340 to establish a just price are usually cloaked in terms of market failure remedies or consumer 45 00:04:15.340 --> 00:04:17.600 protection laws. 46 00:04:17.600 --> 00:04:23.560 The mention of just price theory either invokes a blank stare or, in the case of those familiar 47 00:04:23.560 --> 00:04:31.440 with the term, the dismissal of the notion as a discredited medieval religious doctrine. 48 00:04:31.440 --> 00:04:34.280 All myths, of course, are not created equal. 49 00:04:34.280 --> 00:04:39.040 For instance, the use of the term just price is very different from another widely held 50 00:04:39.040 --> 00:04:42.120 myth, that of the just war. 51 00:04:42.120 --> 00:04:48.140 The principle of the just war underlies our protracted war in Iraq, as well as our global 52 00:04:48.140 --> 00:04:50.800 crusade against terrorism. 53 00:04:50.800 --> 00:04:56.740 In its essence, the doctrine concerns the use of force, when force should be used and 54 00:04:56.740 --> 00:04:59.760 what kind of force is acceptable. 55 00:04:59.760 --> 00:05:03.480 Although many would now argue that the war in Iraq does not meet their criteria for a 56 00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:08.480 just war, they fully accept the concept as legitimate. 57 00:05:08.480 --> 00:05:14.120 In fact, it is the norm rather than the exception when discussions about the war turn to just 58 00:05:14.120 --> 00:05:16.360 war theory. 59 00:05:16.360 --> 00:05:21.280 Americans who don't view themselves as particularly religious, as well as those who have never 60 00:05:21.280 --> 00:05:27.440 studied the finer points of theology and don't generally participate in theological discussions, 61 00:05:27.440 --> 00:05:33.040 have suddenly taken to cloaking their positions with the rhetoric of just war theory. 62 00:05:33.040 --> 00:05:38.180 But aside from the knowledge and usage of the terms, there are some important philosophical 63 00:05:38.180 --> 00:05:43.800 differences between the concepts of the just price and the just war. 64 00:05:43.800 --> 00:05:48.280 There are many individuals who recognize the myth of the just price, yet believe to the 65 00:05:48.280 --> 00:05:51.160 contrary about the just war. 66 00:05:51.160 --> 00:05:56.400 The former is viewed as detrimental to the operation of free market capitalism, while 67 00:05:56.400 --> 00:05:59.920 while the latter is held up as a model for warfare. 68 00:05:59.920 --> 00:06:04.280 A more significant distinction is simply and bluntly this. 69 00:06:04.280 --> 00:06:10.540 Although full implementation in society of the concept of the just price might result 70 00:06:10.540 --> 00:06:17.000 in economic hardship, the loss of liberties, and a command economy, acquiescence in just 71 00:06:17.000 --> 00:06:22.880 one point of just war theory might result in the deaths of thousands of people. 72 00:06:22.880 --> 00:06:27.760 I don't suppose there's anything I write and speak about with more fervor than the biblical, 73 00:06:27.760 --> 00:06:31.840 economic, and political fallacies of religious people. 74 00:06:31.840 --> 00:06:38.040 Whether it is Christian support for victimless crimes, educational vouchers, the military, 75 00:06:38.040 --> 00:06:44.840 preemptive war, or the pseudo-Christianity and faith-based socialism of President Bush, 76 00:06:44.840 --> 00:06:52.840 I have always tried to declare the whole Council of God and destroy Christian reliance in the 77 00:06:52.840 --> 00:06:55.840 and Defense of the State. 78 00:06:55.840 --> 00:06:58.840 As anyone knows who is familiar with my rewrites 79 00:06:58.840 --> 00:07:02.840 from a warmonger perspective of Psalm 23, 80 00:07:02.840 --> 00:07:05.840 the Beatitudes and the Lord's Prayer, 81 00:07:05.840 --> 00:07:08.840 I have always taken a radically, biblically approach 82 00:07:08.840 --> 00:07:11.840 to debunking religious fallacies 83 00:07:11.840 --> 00:07:15.840 and dethroning the Great God State. 84 00:07:15.840 --> 00:07:18.840 And since there is no reason to stop now, 85 00:07:18.840 --> 00:07:21.840 I can therefore passionately say about my subject 86 00:07:21.840 --> 00:07:29.440 subject, that in the absence of fraud, not only is any price agreed upon between a willing 87 00:07:29.440 --> 00:07:36.640 buyer and a willing seller the just price, that alone is what makes it the just price. 88 00:07:36.640 --> 00:07:42.520 It is my desire in this talk to not only break the myth of the just price, but to present 89 00:07:42.520 --> 00:07:45.880 the biblical case for laissez-faire. 90 00:07:45.880 --> 00:07:47.960 But why the biblical case? 91 00:07:47.960 --> 00:07:49.760 Truth is truth, is it not? 92 00:07:49.760 --> 00:07:54.880 2 plus 2 equals 4 is true whether written by an apostle on a parchment or a teacher 93 00:07:54.880 --> 00:07:57.640 on a chalkboard, agreed. 94 00:07:57.640 --> 00:08:03.520 But because the concept of the just price has religious overtones, it is essential that 95 00:08:03.520 --> 00:08:05.980 the biblical case be made. 96 00:08:05.980 --> 00:08:12.040 And not only that, for the Christian, the Scripture not only contains truth, it is truth. 97 00:08:12.040 --> 00:08:17.920 The Bible is our final authority in all matters, secular and sacred, not the natural law, not 98 00:08:17.920 --> 00:08:24.060 Not denominational creeds, not the decisions of church councils, not papal encyclicals, 99 00:08:24.060 --> 00:08:30.400 and not human action, however highly Christians regard, and rightly so, the economic thought 100 00:08:30.400 --> 00:08:32.280 of Ludwig von Mises. 101 00:08:32.280 --> 00:08:36.060 The clarion call for the Christian is, thus saith the Lord. 102 00:08:36.060 --> 00:08:41.320 Not theological treatises, not confessions of faith, not religious traditions, not a 103 00:08:41.320 --> 00:08:47.280 system of philosophy, and not, thus saith, Man Economy and State. 104 00:08:47.280 --> 00:08:53.080 However much Christians are indebted to Murray Rothbard for deepening our understanding of 105 00:08:53.080 --> 00:09:01.280 the potential of the free market and the perniciousness of state intervention into that market. 106 00:09:01.280 --> 00:09:05.040 The concept of justness is a biblical one. 107 00:09:05.040 --> 00:09:08.680 God sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 108 00:09:08.680 --> 00:09:12.280 Christ died for our sins, the just for the unjust. 109 00:09:12.280 --> 00:09:16.880 There will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust. 110 00:09:16.880 --> 00:09:23.460 Now, the expression just price is nowhere to be found in the Scriptures. 111 00:09:23.460 --> 00:09:29.440 This ipso facto does not of course mean that the concept should be dismissed out of hand. 112 00:09:29.440 --> 00:09:33.200 After all, the word Trinity is not in the Bible either. 113 00:09:33.200 --> 00:09:39.700 The Scripture does have some general principles as to when something is just and to what needs 114 00:09:39.700 --> 00:09:41.600 to be done justly. 115 00:09:41.600 --> 00:09:46.120 For instance, a just man does what is lawful and right. 116 00:09:46.120 --> 00:09:49.680 Judgment and rule are to be done justly. 117 00:09:49.680 --> 00:09:52.760 Servants are entitled to what is just and equal. 118 00:09:52.760 --> 00:09:57.120 And we should follow that which is altogether just. 119 00:09:57.120 --> 00:10:02.120 Although there are numerous references in the Bible to things being sold, houses, land, 120 00:10:02.120 --> 00:10:09.080 animals, people, food, there is generally no mention of what the items were sold for. 121 00:10:09.080 --> 00:10:14.880 Twice each we read of an item being sold for full price, the price of an object being 122 00:10:14.880 --> 00:10:19.920 above rubies, and something being of great price. 123 00:10:19.920 --> 00:10:25.440 There are only a few references to a specific price paid for something, the most well-known 124 00:10:25.440 --> 00:10:32.480 examples being Esau selling his birthright for one morsel of meat, and Judas betraying 125 00:10:32.480 --> 00:10:35.920 the Lord for 30 pieces of silver. 126 00:10:35.920 --> 00:10:41.000 Although the scripture doesn't speak of a just price, we do read of a just weight four 127 00:10:41.000 --> 00:10:47.880 times, a just measure five times, and a just balance two times. 128 00:10:47.880 --> 00:10:52.760 In fact, it even says in the book of Proverbs that a false balance is abomination to the 129 00:10:52.760 --> 00:10:57.280 Lord, but a just weight is His delight. 130 00:10:57.280 --> 00:11:03.120 Since following what is altogether just would apply to our commercial transactions, the 131 00:11:03.120 --> 00:11:07.680 The absence of fraud would be essential for the price of any commodity to be said to be 132 00:11:07.680 --> 00:11:15.340 just, but one will search the scriptures in vain for any other concept of what constitutes 133 00:11:15.340 --> 00:11:18.040 a just price. 134 00:11:18.040 --> 00:11:24.080 Right or wrong, the concept of the just price will forever be associated with the medieval 135 00:11:24.080 --> 00:11:29.240 Roman Catholic philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas. 136 00:11:29.240 --> 00:11:35.760 Around about 1225, Aquinas is usually acknowledged as the greatest theologian of the Catholic 137 00:11:35.760 --> 00:11:36.760 Church. 138 00:11:36.760 --> 00:11:43.960 In his great summary of theology, the Summa Theologica, Aquinas discusses the concept 139 00:11:43.960 --> 00:11:51.580 of the just price in the section in his treatise on prudence and justice called of cheating 140 00:11:51.580 --> 00:11:55.040 which is committed in buying and selling. 141 00:11:55.040 --> 00:12:00.640 As Rothbard and others before and after him have pointed out, Aquinas equated the just 142 00:12:00.640 --> 00:12:07.780 price as did the Romanists, canonists, and theologians that preceded him with the common 143 00:12:07.780 --> 00:12:13.520 market price established by the common estimation of buyers and sellers. 144 00:12:13.520 --> 00:12:21.020 However, as Rothbard explains, unfortunately in discussing the just price, St. Thomas stored 145 00:12:21.020 --> 00:12:47.260 The idea that there is a just price in a monetary-economic exchange is not just a medieval phenomenon. 146 00:12:47.260 --> 00:12:51.660 It is perhaps almost as old as commercial activity itself. 147 00:12:51.660 --> 00:12:57.080 The concept has been found recorded in ancient Babylonian inscriptions. 148 00:12:57.080 --> 00:13:03.220 This should come as no surprise, for since the beginning of time, there has been no shortage 149 00:13:03.220 --> 00:13:08.860 of people who thought it was their business to mind everyone else's business. 150 00:13:08.860 --> 00:13:14.420 This is especially true of government bureaucrats, who in the name of serving the public interest 151 00:13:14.420 --> 00:13:21.300 and Protecting the Economically Disadvantaged, Violently Intervene in the Free Market. 152 00:13:21.300 --> 00:13:27.500 Aristotle's erroneous concept of equal value in a commercial exchange not only contributed 153 00:13:27.500 --> 00:13:34.060 to centuries of muddled economic thinking, it was revived and employed as a philosophical 154 00:13:34.060 --> 00:13:39.700 justification for the medieval doctrine of the just price. 155 00:13:39.700 --> 00:13:44.980 One reason for the focus throughout history on the price paid by a buyer in an exchange 156 00:13:44.980 --> 00:13:50.540 was the unwarranted suspicion of merchants and mercantile activity. 157 00:13:50.540 --> 00:13:57.380 Aristotle, like his teacher Plato, disdained money making, labor, commerce, and especially 158 00:13:57.380 --> 00:13:59.340 retail trade. 159 00:13:59.340 --> 00:14:04.540 Many of the early church fathers regarded greed to be the basis of commerce. 160 00:14:04.540 --> 00:14:09.500 Immoral means were considered the rule rather than the exception when it came to commercial 161 00:14:09.500 --> 00:14:11.420 activities. 162 00:14:11.420 --> 00:14:18.600 One party's gain in a transaction was thought to only be achieved by another party's loss. 163 00:14:18.600 --> 00:14:23.460 These ideas continued into the Middle Ages, the positive attitude toward the merchant 164 00:14:23.460 --> 00:14:27.680 of the great church father Augustine notwithstanding. 165 00:14:27.680 --> 00:14:32.960 Two ecclesiastical formulas overshadow the profession of medieval merchants. 166 00:14:32.960 --> 00:14:38.220 He who buys cheap in order to sell deer seeks shameful profit. 167 00:14:38.220 --> 00:14:43.760 And it is difficult among buyers and sellers not to fall into sin. 168 00:14:43.760 --> 00:14:48.280 Under Roman law, the price in a transaction was determined solely by the interaction of 169 00:14:48.280 --> 00:14:50.640 buyer and seller. 170 00:14:50.640 --> 00:14:54.320 Exception was only made for a minor who had been mistaken. 171 00:14:54.320 --> 00:14:59.240 Under the Justinian Code, there were certain instances, such as the sale of land, where 172 00:14:59.240 --> 00:15:04.940 protection was accorded not to the buyer but to the seller if the land was sold for less 173 00:15:04.940 --> 00:15:06.660 than half its value. 174 00:15:06.660 --> 00:15:18.660 Laissez-faire in transactions was the norm. Since all men wished to buy cheap and sell deer, it was expected that buyer and seller would each try to outwit the other. 175 00:15:18.660 --> 00:15:22.660 Fraud, of course, was not tolerated from either party. 176 00:15:22.660 --> 00:15:31.660 Unfortunately, the Roman legacy of freedom of bargaining was sometimes augmented in the Middle Ages by some erroneous ideas. 177 00:15:31.660 --> 00:15:42.160 frowned upon were buying and selling for gain, speculative transactions, buying goods and selling them for a profit without improvements, 178 00:15:42.160 --> 00:15:49.660 selling goods at a price higher than their purchase without necessity, and price increases on credit sales 179 00:15:49.660 --> 00:15:58.660 because it was considered to be concealed usury, which was universally prohibited and defined in the broadest terms. 180 00:15:58.660 --> 00:16:05.660 Distinctions were made between what was allowed in the commercial transactions of the laity and clergy. 181 00:16:05.660 --> 00:16:13.660 In addition to the market price, the just price could also be the price fixed by governments or government-privileged guilds. 182 00:16:13.660 --> 00:16:18.660 There were, however, two viewpoints that were decidedly in the minority. 183 00:16:18.660 --> 00:16:27.660 One, that the just price was only that beyond labor and expenses that enabled the seller to maintain his social status. 184 00:16:27.660 --> 00:16:35.660 and two, that the just price was the cost of production plus compensation for labor and risk incurred. 185 00:16:35.660 --> 00:16:42.660 The former has inaccurately been taken as typical of the scholastic doctrine of the just price. 186 00:16:42.660 --> 00:16:48.660 The latter has given rise to the labor theory of value of Smith, Ricardo and Marx. 187 00:16:48.660 --> 00:16:55.660 It should be pointed out that medieval discussions of labor, expenses, risk and profit 188 00:16:55.660 --> 00:17:03.660 were generally for the purpose of justifying mercantile profits rather than determining just prices. 189 00:17:03.660 --> 00:17:10.660 Like his predecessors, Aquinas maintained the necessity of a just price in every transaction. 190 00:17:10.660 --> 00:17:16.660 In examining his teaching as a whole, we see a number of principles. 191 00:17:16.660 --> 00:17:19.660 The merchant performs a valuable service. 192 00:17:19.660 --> 00:17:23.660 The merchant can conduct business without sinning. 193 00:17:23.660 --> 00:17:32.660 Buying and selling are to the advantage of both parties. Misrepresenting the condition of goods in a sale is fraud. 194 00:17:32.660 --> 00:17:43.660 Price is influenced by changes in supply and demand. Price can vary according to location. Price can vary according to time. 195 00:17:43.660 --> 00:17:52.660 Price is a function of utility. The just price is an estimate and cannot be fixed with mathematical precision. 196 00:17:52.660 --> 00:18:00.660 The just price is the current market price. Price should represent the true value of goods. 197 00:18:00.660 --> 00:18:05.660 It is this latter concept that sends Aquinas off course. 198 00:18:05.660 --> 00:18:17.660 Instead of considering value as purely subjective, he maintained that if either the price exceeds the quantity of the thing's worth, 199 00:18:17.660 --> 00:18:34.660 Or, conversely, the thing exceed the price, there is no longer the equality of justice, and consequently, to sell a thing for more than its worth, or to buy it for less than its worth, is in itself unjust and unlawful. 200 00:18:34.660 --> 00:18:42.660 A seller who has received more than he ought must make compensation to him that has suffered loss, if the loss be considerable. 201 00:18:42.660 --> 00:18:51.660 Just as no man wishes to buy a thing for more than it's worth, so no man should sell a thing to another for more than it's worth. 202 00:18:51.660 --> 00:19:04.660 To his credit, Aquinas prescribed neither the authorities by whom nor the means by which any deviation from the just price was to be enforced. 203 00:19:04.660 --> 00:19:11.460 Interest. He never explicitly called for any state action other than the establishing of 204 00:19:11.460 --> 00:19:17.820 weights and measures. And lest my Catholic friends feel that I am picking on them, I 205 00:19:17.820 --> 00:19:24.420 should say that Luther challenged neither the notion of intrinsic value nor the immorality 206 00:19:24.420 --> 00:19:30.820 of taking interest. For Catholics in particular, I wholeheartedly recommend The Church and 207 00:19:30.820 --> 00:19:38.020 and the Market, a Catholic defense of the free market or free economy by the Mises Institute's 208 00:19:38.020 --> 00:19:40.300 Tom Woods. 209 00:19:40.300 --> 00:19:46.900 It would be left to the Thomistic Spanish scholastics of the 16th century to emphasize 210 00:19:46.900 --> 00:19:51.380 that there was no objective way of determining price. 211 00:19:51.380 --> 00:19:58.740 The jurist Francisco de Vitoria and his disciples in the school of Salamanca maintained that 212 00:19:58.740 --> 00:20:05.980 The price was simply based on supply and demand, without regard to labor costs or expenses. 213 00:20:05.980 --> 00:20:12.100 The inefficiency of producers, the misfortune of speculators, and any other negative consequences 214 00:20:12.100 --> 00:20:18.540 of incompetence or bad luck were to be borne by sellers and buyers alike. 215 00:20:18.540 --> 00:20:25.500 Even the seller of luxuries, superfluities, and frivolities could, in the absence of fraud, 216 00:20:25.500 --> 00:20:31.580 Deceder Coercion, except any price that a buyer was willing to pay. 217 00:20:31.580 --> 00:20:37.820 Contrary to Jean Gerson, Chancellor of the University of Paris, who had earlier suggested 218 00:20:37.820 --> 00:20:44.540 that price fixing be extended to all commodities on the ground that no one should presume to 219 00:20:44.540 --> 00:20:53.380 be wiser than the lawmaker, followers of the School of Salamanca opposed all price regulation 220 00:20:53.380 --> 00:21:01.980 because it was unnecessary in times of plenty and ineffective or harmful in times of Darth. 221 00:21:01.980 --> 00:21:07.620 To say that these ideas were neglected is a colossal understatement. 222 00:21:07.620 --> 00:21:13.700 The history of economic thought is the history of the attempt by special interest groups 223 00:21:13.700 --> 00:21:20.160 and government nannies to set or regulate prices of goods and services. 224 00:21:20.160 --> 00:21:26.520 Here we are 400 years later in the United States of America, that great bastion of capitalism 225 00:21:26.520 --> 00:21:28.160 and free markets. 226 00:21:28.160 --> 00:21:29.920 And what do we see? 227 00:21:29.920 --> 00:21:36.760 We see nothing but interventionism, which, as Mises reminds us, is a method for the transformation 228 00:21:36.760 --> 00:21:44.160 of capitalism into socialism by a series of successive steps. 229 00:21:44.160 --> 00:21:47.840 Here are some examples. 230 00:21:47.840 --> 00:21:54.160 Congress recently raised the federal minimum wage because, in its infinite wisdom, it decided 231 00:21:54.160 --> 00:22:00.480 that the just price for labor was a minimum of $5.85 an hour. 232 00:22:00.480 --> 00:22:08.000 However, Congress has already decided that its just price for labor will be unjust on 233 00:22:08.000 --> 00:22:15.760 July 24th of this year, necessitating a new minimum wage of $6.55 an hour. 234 00:22:15.760 --> 00:22:22.200 And with econometric precision, that figure has already been decreed to be unjust on July 235 00:22:22.200 --> 00:22:28.700 24th of next year and rise again to $7.25 an hour. 236 00:22:28.700 --> 00:22:35.100 One does not have to be an economist to see the detrimental effects of minimum wage legislation. 237 00:22:35.100 --> 00:22:39.620 It is an undeniable fact that businesses' labor costs will increase. 238 00:22:39.620 --> 00:22:45.300 This will result in profits decreasing unless the increased costs can be offset by raising 239 00:22:45.300 --> 00:22:52.060 If this is not possible, then a business is forced to either go out of business or live 240 00:22:52.060 --> 00:22:54.620 with a lower profit margin. 241 00:22:54.620 --> 00:22:59.300 But it is not just businesses that are harmed by minimum wage legislation. 242 00:22:59.300 --> 00:23:04.460 Because the minimum wage raises employment barriers for the unskilled and uneducated, 243 00:23:04.460 --> 00:23:06.380 it causes unemployment. 244 00:23:06.380 --> 00:23:11.180 And even more important than the economic case against the minimum wage is the fact 245 00:23:11.180 --> 00:23:15.340 The fact that minimum wage laws violate freedom of contract. 246 00:23:15.340 --> 00:23:20.380 They infringe the right of an employer and an employee to make whatever wage agreement 247 00:23:20.380 --> 00:23:22.660 they choose. 248 00:23:22.660 --> 00:23:28.360 Minimum wage laws also foster the notion that government is responsible for our well-being 249 00:23:28.360 --> 00:23:30.860 and prosperity. 250 00:23:30.860 --> 00:23:36.780 Congress has worked overtime to ensure that U.S. sugar producers receive a just price 251 00:23:36.780 --> 00:23:38.700 for their sugar. 252 00:23:38.700 --> 00:23:44.540 With the exception of a brief four-year period at the end of the 19th century, the United 253 00:23:44.540 --> 00:23:51.780 States has maintained import duties on all imported sugar since 1798. 254 00:23:51.780 --> 00:23:58.540 Since their reimposition in 1894, these tariffs have been in place for the sole purpose of 255 00:23:58.540 --> 00:24:02.320 propping up the domestic sugar industry. 256 00:24:02.320 --> 00:24:08.880 The combination of low import quotas, high tariffs, marketing allotments, high support 257 00:24:08.880 --> 00:24:15.080 prices, and access to non-recourse loans makes sugar processing in the United States 258 00:24:15.080 --> 00:24:17.320 a sweet deal. 259 00:24:17.320 --> 00:24:22.480 The result of all this is an artificially high price for sugar, two to four times the 260 00:24:22.480 --> 00:24:26.180 price of sugar sold on the world market. 261 00:24:26.180 --> 00:24:31.080 Under the non-recourse loan program, if the government-manipulated market price of sugar 262 00:24:31.080 --> 00:24:37.440 When sugar drops below the set loan rate of 18 cents a pound for cane sugar or 22 cents 263 00:24:37.440 --> 00:24:45.040 a pound for beet sugar, then processors can forfeit their sugar as loan repayment. 264 00:24:45.040 --> 00:24:50.880 The gang of thieves in Congress who accept millions in bribes each congressional election 265 00:24:50.880 --> 00:24:55.800 from their sugar daddies in the sugar industry are costing American consumers hundreds of 266 00:24:55.800 --> 00:25:08.840 The Taxpayers are also getting screwed when non-recourse loans are repaid in sugar, which 267 00:25:08.840 --> 00:25:12.520 then must be stored and disposed of. 268 00:25:12.520 --> 00:25:14.760 But why stop with sugar? 269 00:25:14.760 --> 00:25:18.480 Why not bacon and eggs, or liver and onions? 270 00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:23.600 Aren't producers of these items entitled to a just price for their goods? 271 00:25:23.600 --> 00:25:30.980 Why the special protection for sugar? Is sugar essential to national security? 272 00:25:30.980 --> 00:25:37.660 Price gouging laws are predicated on the fallacy that there is a just price for every good 273 00:25:37.660 --> 00:25:46.160 and service, and even more so during bad weather or some government declared state of emergency. 274 00:25:46.160 --> 00:25:53.400 The U.S. House passed the Federal Price Gouging Prevention Act last year. This proposed law 275 00:25:53.400 --> 00:26:00.740 would make it unlawful during a period proclaimed by the president as an energy emergency to 276 00:26:00.740 --> 00:26:09.960 sell gasoline or any other petroleum distillate at a price that, one, is unconscionably excessive, 277 00:26:09.960 --> 00:26:16.900 or two, indicates the seller is taking unfair advantage of the circumstances of an emergency 278 00:26:16.900 --> 00:26:20.320 to increase prices unreasonably. 279 00:26:20.320 --> 00:26:50.320 According to the statutes of my state, Florida, it is unlawful during a state of emergency declared by the Governor for a person or his agent or employee to rent or sell or offer to rent or sell at an unconscionable price within the area for which the state of emergency is declared any essential commodity, including, but not limited to, supplies, services, provisions or equipment that is necessary 280 00:26:50.320 --> 00:27:01.320 And how does the state of Florida determine that a price is unconscionable? 281 00:27:01.320 --> 00:27:11.320 Simple. According to Florida statutes, Title 33, Chapter 501, Section 160, 282 00:27:11.320 --> 00:27:18.320 the amount charged represents a gross disparity between the price of the commodity or rental or lease 283 00:27:18.320 --> 00:27:48.320 The lease of any dwelling unit or self-storage facility that is the subject of the offer or transaction and the average price at which that commodity or dwelling unit or self-storage facility was rented, leased, sold, or offered for rent or sale in the usual course of business during the 30 days immediately prior to a declaration of a state of emergency and the increase in the amount charged is not attributable to additional costs incurred 284 00:27:48.320 --> 00:27:53.900 in connection with the rental or sale of the commodity, or rental or lease of any dwelling 285 00:27:53.900 --> 00:28:01.500 unit or self-storage facility, or national or international market trends, or the amount 286 00:28:01.500 --> 00:28:06.820 charged grossly exceeds the average price at which the same or similar commodity was 287 00:28:06.820 --> 00:28:12.620 readily obtainable in the trade area during the 30 days immediately prior to a declaration 288 00:28:12.620 --> 00:28:18.060 of a State of Emergency, and the increase in the amount charged is not attributable to 289 00:28:18.060 --> 00:28:24.020 additional costs incurred in connection with the rental or sale of the commodity or rental 290 00:28:24.020 --> 00:28:29.620 or lease of any dwelling unit or self-storage facility or national or international market 291 00:28:29.620 --> 00:28:31.620 trends. 292 00:28:31.620 --> 00:28:40.900 I have been accused of using long sentences in some of my articles, but that was a 196-word 293 00:28:40.900 --> 00:28:43.500 sentence. 294 00:28:43.500 --> 00:28:50.860 But if you thought it would be okay for someone to help a Floridian during a state of emergency 295 00:28:50.860 --> 00:28:56.860 by offering him goods and services at a lower than market price, think again. 296 00:28:56.860 --> 00:29:03.380 It is a crime in Florida to offer goods and services for sale to the public during an 297 00:29:03.380 --> 00:29:09.140 emergency unless one possesses a Florida business license. 298 00:29:09.140 --> 00:29:15.900 There can be price gouging when no state of emergency exists. 299 00:29:15.900 --> 00:29:23.620 The U.S. Department of Energy maintains a website with a gas price watch reporting form. 300 00:29:23.620 --> 00:29:28.380 Because the Department of Energy is very concerned about the impact of gasoline prices on American 301 00:29:28.380 --> 00:29:35.540 families, it is working not only to address supply issues, but also to make sure American 302 00:29:35.540 --> 00:29:38.080 families are being treated fairly. 303 00:29:38.080 --> 00:29:45.280 So if you know nothing about supply and demand, refinery capacity, gasoline futures, world 304 00:29:45.280 --> 00:29:50.600 surplus production capacity, and the price of a barrel of crude oil, but believe there 305 00:29:50.600 --> 00:29:56.580 may be price gouging, you are instructed by the Energy Department to contact your local 306 00:29:56.580 --> 00:30:00.960 authorities and fill out the form below. 307 00:30:00.960 --> 00:30:06.660 Anyone with any economic sense knows that price gouging is nothing more than charging 308 00:30:06.660 --> 00:30:11.500 Understanding what the market will bear. Price gouging laws violate the property rights of 309 00:30:11.500 --> 00:30:17.700 resource owners, they hinder the price system's signaling ability, they contribute to the 310 00:30:17.700 --> 00:30:25.220 misallocation of resources, and they cause shortages. Anti-dumping laws are among the 311 00:30:25.220 --> 00:30:32.700 most illogical attempts by governments to maintain a just price for a good, because 312 00:30:32.700 --> 00:30:38.340 Rather than being concerned with protecting the consumer from high prices, anti-dumping 313 00:30:38.340 --> 00:30:45.980 laws punish foreign producers for daring to offer to consumers low prices. 314 00:30:45.980 --> 00:30:51.620 So in the eyes of government economists, the just price of a good might actually be a price 315 00:30:51.620 --> 00:30:54.860 higher than someone is willing to pay. 316 00:30:54.860 --> 00:31:00.780 A foreign manufacturer is normally accused of dumping when the price of a product it 317 00:31:00.780 --> 00:31:07.380 Exports to Another Country is below the product's cost of production or the price it charges 318 00:31:07.380 --> 00:31:10.660 for the product in its own country. 319 00:31:10.660 --> 00:31:16.180 Anti-dumping laws are even more insidious than the dubious concept of predatory pricing. 320 00:31:16.180 --> 00:31:21.460 A foreign firm can be charged with dumping and have to pay anti-dumping duties for the 321 00:31:21.460 --> 00:31:26.380 crime of trying to compete in the U.S. marketplace. 322 00:31:26.380 --> 00:31:29.140 Anti-dumping laws are not designed to protect the public. 323 00:31:29.140 --> 00:31:33.880 They are designed to protect domestic producers from foreign competition. 324 00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:40.260 They are merely another form of protectionism to ensure that selected U.S. firms receive 325 00:31:40.260 --> 00:31:43.600 just prices for their goods. 326 00:31:43.600 --> 00:31:47.780 And who decides what constitutes these just prices? 327 00:31:47.780 --> 00:31:54.100 Why the firms do, along with any congressmen they can bribe or otherwise convince. 328 00:31:54.100 --> 00:31:59.960 Since many tariffs are gradually being reduced or eliminated, anti-dumping laws allow countries 329 00:31:59.960 --> 00:32:04.860 to preach free trade while practicing protectionism. 330 00:32:04.860 --> 00:32:10.780 Like the removal of tariffs and the practice of real free trade, as opposed to government-managed 331 00:32:10.780 --> 00:32:16.760 trade deals, the elimination of anti-dumping laws results in increased competition, which 332 00:32:16.760 --> 00:32:33.120 Nothing in history has resulted in more attempts by governments to establish a just price than 333 00:32:33.120 --> 00:32:42.560 the question of usury. Ethically, usury is an exorbitant interest rate. Legally, usury 334 00:32:42.560 --> 00:32:45.760 Usury is an illegal interest rate. 335 00:32:45.760 --> 00:32:51.320 But in what is now viewed as its archaic or obsolete sense, usury is simply the price 336 00:32:51.320 --> 00:32:56.800 of interest charged on a loan for the lack of the use of the money and the risk of loss. 337 00:32:56.800 --> 00:33:03.080 Thus, we have this artificial distinction between usury and interest. 338 00:33:03.080 --> 00:33:07.600 Beginning with the fourth century prohibition against the clergy charging interest on a 339 00:33:07.600 --> 00:33:13.800 On A Loan. Usury of any kind was almost universally condemned throughout the Middle Ages. The 340 00:33:13.800 --> 00:33:20.960 charging of interest on a loan came to be viewed as theft. Not surprisingly, usurers, 341 00:33:20.960 --> 00:33:28.560 that is, moneylenders, were despised. In Dante's The Divine Comedy, he has usurers in the seventh 342 00:33:28.560 --> 00:33:36.920 circle of hell along with blasphemers and sodomites. Aquinas, unfortunately, in spite 343 00:33:36.920 --> 00:33:43.000 of the inner contradictions in his treatment of usury contributed greatly to the irrationality 344 00:33:43.000 --> 00:33:49.200 and errant nonsense that characterized medieval usury doctrine. 345 00:33:49.200 --> 00:33:54.260 The distinction between usury and interest arose because of the attempt to circumvent 346 00:33:54.260 --> 00:33:57.340 the medieval condemnation of usury. 347 00:33:57.340 --> 00:34:04.320 As Rothbard explains, jurists and theologians had to engage in ingenious and artful twists 348 00:34:04.320 --> 00:34:10.280 in Reasoning in order to make exceptions from the prohibition and to accommodate the 349 00:34:10.280 --> 00:34:15.280 growing practice of lending money and charging interest on a loan. 350 00:34:15.280 --> 00:34:20.660 Although Luther shared the scholastic aversion to taking usury, the French reformer John 351 00:34:20.660 --> 00:34:27.120 Calvin is often credited with releasing the world from the shackles of medieval usury. 352 00:34:27.120 --> 00:34:33.900 Calvin, however, was no Claudius Salmaceus, a Dutch Calvinist of the 17th century who 353 00:34:33.900 --> 00:34:38.860 who has the honor of putting the final boot to the usury prohibition. 354 00:34:38.860 --> 00:34:43.660 Calvin tempered his acceptance of usury with some qualifications. 355 00:34:43.660 --> 00:34:46.200 Usury shouldn't be taken from the poor. 356 00:34:46.200 --> 00:34:50.420 No one should engage in usury as his form of occupation. 357 00:34:50.420 --> 00:34:54.020 Usury should be practiced with equity and charity. 358 00:34:54.020 --> 00:34:57.220 The problem with Calvin's latter condition is obvious. 359 00:34:57.220 --> 00:35:00.540 What rate of interest is equitable and charitable? 360 00:35:00.540 --> 00:35:04.620 In other words, what is the just price of borrowed money? 361 00:35:04.620 --> 00:35:09.380 And once a just interest rate is determined, who is to regulate its enforcement? 362 00:35:09.380 --> 00:35:11.540 Why the state, of course. 363 00:35:11.540 --> 00:35:16.100 That's why there was a ceiling on interest rates in Calvin's Geneva. 364 00:35:16.100 --> 00:35:22.380 And that's why all of the 50 states regulate interest rates today in the 21st century. 365 00:35:22.380 --> 00:35:27.500 To say that usury is a complicated area of law is a tremendous understatement. 366 00:35:27.500 --> 00:35:33.860 The laws vary widely from state to state. According to Florida statutes, it shall be 367 00:35:33.860 --> 00:35:40.260 usury and unlawful for any person, or for any agent, officer, or other representative 368 00:35:40.260 --> 00:35:47.500 of any person, to reserve, charge, or take for any loan, advance of money, line of credit, 369 00:35:47.500 --> 00:35:52.820 forbearance to enforce the collection of any sum of money, or other obligation, a rate 370 00:35:52.820 --> 00:35:58.700 The rate of interest greater than the equivalent of 18% simple interest. 371 00:35:58.700 --> 00:36:03.220 Although the state of Florida doesn't actually know what the just price for barred money 372 00:36:03.220 --> 00:36:11.020 should be, it claims to know that the maximum rate of interest that can be charged is 18%. 373 00:36:11.020 --> 00:36:16.880 An increase in this amount by the slightest percent would render the rate unjust and subject 374 00:36:16.880 --> 00:36:19.300 the lender to criminal penalties. 375 00:36:19.300 --> 00:36:21.540 And what is the basis of this rate? 376 00:36:21.540 --> 00:36:26.340 It is not based on the prime rate, federal funds rate, the discount rate, or the LIBOR 377 00:36:26.340 --> 00:36:27.340 rate. 378 00:36:27.340 --> 00:36:31.540 It is not based on the rate of U.S. Treasury bonds, notes, or bills. 379 00:36:31.540 --> 00:36:34.180 It is not based on the market rate. 380 00:36:34.180 --> 00:36:37.460 It is not even based on some historical average. 381 00:36:37.460 --> 00:36:44.800 The maximum rate is 18 percent because lawyers, economists, and legislators in the employee 382 00:36:44.800 --> 00:36:46.780 of the state of Florida say so. 383 00:36:46.780 --> 00:36:47.780 That's why. 384 00:36:47.780 --> 00:36:53.220 Yet, if one crosses the border into Alabama, the rate drops to 8 percent. 385 00:36:53.220 --> 00:36:57.260 What is just in Alabama is unjust in Florida. 386 00:36:57.260 --> 00:37:00.900 The case against usury laws has been made for hundreds of years. 387 00:37:00.900 --> 00:37:06.980 In Great Britain, Jeremy Bentham penned a defense of usury back in 1796, in which he 388 00:37:06.980 --> 00:37:14.580 made the same proposition that no man of ripe years and of sound mind, acting freely and 389 00:37:14.580 --> 00:37:19.980 and with his eyes open ought to be hindered with a view to his advantage from making such 390 00:37:19.980 --> 00:37:26.940 bargain in the way of obtaining money as he thinks fit, nor anybody hindered from supplying 391 00:37:26.940 --> 00:37:31.860 him upon any terms he thinks proper to accede to. 392 00:37:31.860 --> 00:37:37.980 The American poet William Cullen Bryant wrote a powerful critique of usury laws back in 393 00:37:37.980 --> 00:37:40.020 1836. 394 00:37:40.020 --> 00:37:46.220 Murray points out what the authors of the Community Reinvestment Act should have realized. 395 00:37:46.220 --> 00:37:52.020 There is an intrinsic and obvious difference between borrowers, which not only justifies 396 00:37:52.020 --> 00:37:58.100 but absolutely demands on the part of a prudent man disposed to relieve the wants of applicants 397 00:37:58.100 --> 00:38:00.720 a very different rate of interest. 398 00:38:00.720 --> 00:38:06.420 Two persons can hardly present themselves in precisely equal circumstances to solicit 399 00:38:06.420 --> 00:38:08.040 alone. 400 00:38:08.040 --> 00:38:13.720 One man is cautious, another is rash. One is a close calculator, sober in his views, 401 00:38:13.720 --> 00:38:19.800 and unexcitable in his temperament. Another is visionary and enthusiastic. One has tangible 402 00:38:19.800 --> 00:38:25.200 security to offer, another nothing but every one of a promise. Who shall say that to lend 403 00:38:25.200 --> 00:38:31.260 money to these several persons is worth in each case an equal premium? And as Rothbard 404 00:38:31.260 --> 00:38:37.000 has pointed out, money lending is a business in the market like any other business. If 405 00:38:37.000 --> 00:38:41.800 If the number of users multiplies, the price of money or interest will be driven down by 406 00:38:41.800 --> 00:38:48.880 the competition, so that if one doesn't like high interest rates, the more users the better. 407 00:38:48.880 --> 00:38:56.560 I have maintained that in the absence of fraud, not in the absence of ignorance, laziness, 408 00:38:56.560 --> 00:39:03.660 greed or stupidity, not only is any price agreed upon between a willing buyer and a 409 00:39:03.660 --> 00:39:10.260 and a willing seller the just price, that alone is what makes it the just price. 410 00:39:10.260 --> 00:39:18.300 A just price for an item does not exist independently of a transaction between buyer and seller. 411 00:39:18.300 --> 00:39:25.460 It is both impossible and immoral for any governmental body to institute, regulate, 412 00:39:25.460 --> 00:39:29.940 control or recommend what is a just price. 413 00:39:29.940 --> 00:39:33.580 It is impossible because the state is not omniscient. 414 00:39:33.580 --> 00:39:38.940 It is immoral because the state has no authority to intervene in the market. 415 00:39:38.940 --> 00:39:43.860 Even if it were possible to establish the just price of goods and services outside of 416 00:39:43.860 --> 00:39:50.740 a market transaction, no governmental agency or regulatory body, even with the army of 417 00:39:50.740 --> 00:39:58.660 economists in the employ of the U.S. government that is now 4,800 strong, is capable of determining 418 00:39:58.660 --> 00:40:01.580 what that just price should be. 419 00:40:01.580 --> 00:40:08.580 simply can't be done, unless, of course, we want to ascribe omniscience to the state. 420 00:40:08.580 --> 00:40:14.820 And as Mises explains, once price control is declared a task of government, an indefinite 421 00:40:14.820 --> 00:40:21.180 number of price ceilings must be fixed and many of them must, with changing conditions, 422 00:40:21.180 --> 00:40:24.060 be altered again and again. 423 00:40:24.060 --> 00:40:31.060 Okay, says the non-believer and state omniscience, but the state is still smarter than the citizenry. 424 00:40:31.060 --> 00:40:36.780 The masses need consumer protection, lest they enter into unregulated and unmonitored 425 00:40:36.780 --> 00:40:38.500 unjust exchanges. 426 00:40:38.500 --> 00:40:43.400 We need the state to watch out for us and prevent us from entering into these unjust 427 00:40:43.400 --> 00:40:48.780 exchanges or at least warning us of foretime or informing us afterward. 428 00:40:48.780 --> 00:40:54.380 True, people voluntarily engage in these unjust exchanges, but they don't realize that they 429 00:40:54.380 --> 00:40:56.240 are unjust. 430 00:40:56.240 --> 00:40:58.160 Now I see the light. 431 00:40:58.160 --> 00:41:04.800 The state is not a god, it is just a nanny. But the state is some nanny. It is the only 432 00:41:04.800 --> 00:41:10.260 nanny that forces you to hire her. It is the only nanny that moonlights as a policeman 433 00:41:10.260 --> 00:41:17.260 to the world. It is the only nanny that employs coercion, compulsion, threats, fines and imprisonment. 434 00:41:18.120 --> 00:41:23.080 This brings up the question of the role of the state. I have maintained that it would 435 00:41:23.080 --> 00:41:27.800 would be immoral for the state to intervene in the market. 436 00:41:27.800 --> 00:41:35.560 In the natural order of things, it is normal to engage in commerce with whomever and regarding 437 00:41:35.560 --> 00:41:38.640 whatever one desires. 438 00:41:38.640 --> 00:41:45.360 Why should it be considered criminal if your neighbor forcibly interferes with your buying, 439 00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:53.360 selling, renting, leasing, borrowing and lending, but benevolent if the government does it. 440 00:41:53.360 --> 00:41:58.360 The purpose of government is supposed to be to protect life, liberty and property. 441 00:41:58.360 --> 00:42:04.360 And as one of the anti-Federalists stated, for any government to do more than this is impossible. 442 00:42:04.360 --> 00:42:08.360 And every one that falls short of it is defective. 443 00:42:08.360 --> 00:42:14.360 If there is such a thing as a just price, then the extent to which it influences one's pricing decisions 444 00:42:14.360 --> 00:42:21.240 Vices should be a function of religion, ethics and morality, not a function of law. 445 00:42:21.240 --> 00:42:26.600 I will even grant that it might be immoral under certain circumstances to charge a particular 446 00:42:26.600 --> 00:42:30.240 price, but that doesn't mean it should be illegal. 447 00:42:30.240 --> 00:42:32.840 Vices are not crimes. 448 00:42:32.840 --> 00:42:38.440 Saying that a just price is a moral imperative is one thing, but making it a legal device 449 00:42:38.440 --> 00:42:44.920 is something else that opens up the deadly can of worms of government intervention that 450 00:42:44.920 --> 00:42:47.080 can never be closed. 451 00:42:47.080 --> 00:42:55.880 The separation of market and state is just as important as separation of church and state. 452 00:42:55.880 --> 00:43:01.320 There are two reasons why I must present the biblical case for laissez-faire. 453 00:43:01.320 --> 00:43:06.320 The first I've already mentioned, the scripture is the Christian's authority, not a particular 454 00:43:06.320 --> 00:43:20.320 The Second Reason is a very distressing one. The economic views of the typical Christian economist parallel that of Karl Marx and John Maynard Keynes. 455 00:43:20.320 --> 00:43:29.320 The inequality of wealth is a particular problem for all three individuals. Here is Marx in his Das Kapitel. 456 00:43:29.320 --> 00:43:36.820 In proportion as capital accumulates, the lot of the laborer, be his payment high or low, must grow worse. 457 00:43:36.820 --> 00:43:49.320 Accumulation of wealth at one pole is at the same time accumulation of misery, agony of toil, slavery, ignorance, brutality, mental degradation at the opposite pole. 458 00:43:49.320 --> 00:43:52.320 Here is Keynes in his general theory. 459 00:43:52.320 --> 00:44:04.320 The outstanding faults of the economic society in which we live are its failure to provide full employment and its arbitrary and inequitable distribution of wealth and incomes. 460 00:44:04.320 --> 00:44:16.320 But here is Robert L. White, a Christian, in biblical economics, economic myths versus biblical values, published just a couple of years ago. 461 00:44:16.320 --> 00:44:28.320 The working of the market economy over the last 20 years has resulted in increasing inequalities, persistent poverty, chronic unemployment, and more persons without health insurance. 462 00:44:28.320 --> 00:44:37.320 These increasing inequalities are far beyond what could be considered fair and just according to historical standards. 463 00:44:37.320 --> 00:44:44.320 White holds master's degrees in economics and divinity and has worked as both a pastor and an economist. 464 00:44:44.320 --> 00:44:50.320 He was actually one of those 4,800 government economists I mentioned previously. 465 00:44:50.320 --> 00:44:56.320 I hope that White's gospel preaching was more biblical than his economic pronouncements. 466 00:44:56.320 --> 00:45:00.320 Here is some more of White's biblical economics. 467 00:45:00.320 --> 00:45:03.320 If some have too much and others have too little, 468 00:45:03.320 --> 00:45:08.320 the answer from the Bible is that nobody should have too much and nobody should have too little. 469 00:45:08.320 --> 00:45:10.320 Everyone should have enough. 470 00:45:10.320 --> 00:45:17.000 There is enough to go around, so long as each of us takes only what each person needs. 471 00:45:17.000 --> 00:45:22.380 The concept of fairness is that people are obligated to give back in proportion to what 472 00:45:22.380 --> 00:45:24.760 they have received. 473 00:45:24.760 --> 00:45:31.000 Social justice requires that a just society be characterized by a continual improvement 474 00:45:31.000 --> 00:45:34.560 in the prospects of the least advantaged. 475 00:45:34.560 --> 00:45:40.960 There is no theoretical or empirical reason to expect all of society's economic objectives 476 00:45:40.960 --> 00:45:44.060 to be met systematically by the market. 477 00:45:44.060 --> 00:45:50.600 In other words, justice, equity and fairness cannot be assumed to occur automatically, 478 00:45:50.600 --> 00:45:56.680 and therefore need to be intentional goals and objectives of public policy. 479 00:45:56.680 --> 00:46:00.720 According to White, the free market economy is an idol. 480 00:46:00.720 --> 00:46:06.880 There is a cultural war waging between the prevailing free market ideology and biblical 481 00:46:06.880 --> 00:46:07.880 values. 482 00:46:07.880 --> 00:46:14.840 Today's prevailing economic ideology promotes greed and consumerism over the common good. 483 00:46:14.840 --> 00:46:19.280 The lesson we are supposed to receive from Jesus feeding of the multitudes is that if 484 00:46:19.280 --> 00:46:23.920 bread is broken and shared, there will be enough for all. 485 00:46:23.920 --> 00:46:27.880 Because White believes that the rich have been getting richer and the poor poorer, he 486 00:46:27.880 --> 00:46:31.100 He deplores reductions in tax rates. 487 00:46:31.100 --> 00:46:36.700 He rightly decries increased defense spending, but only because it diverts the funding of 488 00:46:36.700 --> 00:46:38.600 social programs. 489 00:46:38.600 --> 00:46:42.020 He favors national health care and environmentalism. 490 00:46:42.020 --> 00:46:46.640 He is also very concerned about global warming and greenhouse gas emissions. 491 00:46:46.640 --> 00:46:52.120 In short, he rejects laissez-faire in favor of government intervention. 492 00:46:52.120 --> 00:47:22.120 White, of course, is not alone. When noted Christian economist, Donald Hay, proposed eight biblical principles relating to contemporary economic life, he not only specifically excluded private property rights, he also stated that the government should not hesitate to use their traditional tax and transfer mechanisms to ensure that those without the means to acquire the basic necessities are provided for. 493 00:47:22.120 --> 00:47:31.120 But White is typical. His trinity is the state, the earth, and social justice. He is a status through and through. 494 00:47:31.120 --> 00:47:40.120 Contrary to White, I believe that the whole spirit of the New Testament is one of laissez-faire. 495 00:47:40.120 --> 00:47:47.120 By laissez-faire, I mean no government intervention, no protectionism, no granting of privileges, 496 00:47:47.120 --> 00:48:05.120 no redistribution of wealth, no anti-poverty programs, no unemployment programs, no subsidies, no price fixing, no regulation, no antitrust laws, no labor legislation, no central planning, no nanny state. 497 00:48:05.120 --> 00:48:32.120 Thus a laissez-faire economic system encompasses free markets, the free price system, free trade, entrepreneurship, consumer sovereignty, private charity, private ownership, private means of production, private property, private goods, private innovation, freedom of contract, freedom of choice, individual responsibility, as well as the risk of loss and the potential for failure. 498 00:48:32.120 --> 00:48:42.120 And as Rothbard explains, the laissez-faire, or free market doctrine, does not assume that everyone always knows his own interests best. 499 00:48:42.120 --> 00:48:51.120 It asserts rather that everyone should have the right to be free to pursue his own interests as he deems best. 500 00:48:51.120 --> 00:48:58.120 It is only natural that men have the freedom to be left alone and to do what they will with their own. 501 00:48:58.120 --> 00:49:05.400 from. Christian status like Robert White can neither establish nor confirm their position 502 00:49:05.400 --> 00:49:12.080 from the New Testament without reading their conception of social justice back in the Bible, 503 00:49:12.080 --> 00:49:18.040 applying to the government admonitions given to individuals, and opaquely misreading the 504 00:49:18.040 --> 00:49:22.640 Scriptures through interventionist glasses. 505 00:49:22.640 --> 00:49:27.480 First of all, we need to examine the subject of wealth in the Bible. 506 00:49:27.480 --> 00:49:32.220 We know that there are some negative things said in the Scriptures about riches and rich 507 00:49:32.220 --> 00:49:33.400 men. 508 00:49:33.400 --> 00:49:38.420 We are told in the book of Proverbs that riches profit not in the day of wrath. 509 00:49:38.420 --> 00:49:42.880 We read in the book of Luke about the rich man in hell, the rich man who built greater 510 00:49:42.880 --> 00:49:48.100 barns to lay up treasure for himself, and the rich men who merely cast out of their 511 00:49:48.100 --> 00:49:50.700 abundance into the treasury. 512 00:49:50.700 --> 00:49:55.140 But it is not riches, per se, that are disparaged in the Bible. 513 00:49:55.140 --> 00:50:01.980 Rather, it is trusting in riches, boasting in riches, coveting riches, or obtaining riches 514 00:50:01.980 --> 00:50:03.760 unlawfully. 515 00:50:03.760 --> 00:50:07.500 Some of the greatest men in the Old Testament were also some of the richest. 516 00:50:07.500 --> 00:50:15.020 Men like Abraham, Job, David, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah, and of course, King Solomon, who, 517 00:50:15.020 --> 00:50:21.180 As he was blessed by God, passed all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom. 518 00:50:21.180 --> 00:50:26.180 In the New Testament, the man who received the body of Jesus from Pilate and properly 519 00:50:26.180 --> 00:50:31.640 buried it in his own new tomb was a rich man, Joseph of Arimathea. 520 00:50:31.640 --> 00:50:37.060 The New Testament admonishes the rich not to become poor, but to be not high-minded 521 00:50:37.060 --> 00:50:42.440 nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things 522 00:50:42.440 --> 00:50:44.340 to enjoy. 523 00:50:44.340 --> 00:50:57.840 Contrary to Marx and the U.S. government's estate tax, parents ought to lay up for the children, and a good man leaveeth an inheritance to his children's children. 524 00:50:57.840 --> 00:51:03.180 It is not money itself, but the love of money that is vilified in the New Testament. 525 00:51:03.180 --> 00:51:13.800 As Rothbard recognized, fulminations against excessive love of money do not necessarily imply hostility to commerce or wealth. 526 00:51:13.800 --> 00:51:17.480 Thank God for rich men who use their money wisely. 527 00:51:17.480 --> 00:51:23.920 Many Christian ministries have been funded by wealthy individuals, as has the Mises Institute. 528 00:51:23.920 --> 00:51:30.740 There is no imperative or implication in the New Testament for the state or any individual 529 00:51:30.740 --> 00:51:33.640 to seek the redistribution of wealth. 530 00:51:33.640 --> 00:51:39.000 Secondly, we need to revisit the subject of poverty. 531 00:51:39.000 --> 00:51:43.000 Neglecting or oppressing the poor is greatly disparaged in the Bible. 532 00:51:43.000 --> 00:51:49.920 However, the idea that individuals, let alone the state, should seek to eradicate poverty 533 00:51:49.920 --> 00:51:53.800 is never advanced in the Old or New Testaments. 534 00:51:53.800 --> 00:51:57.120 God told the people of Israel in the book of Deuteronomy, 535 00:51:57.120 --> 00:52:00.400 For the poor shall never cease out of the land. 536 00:52:00.400 --> 00:52:04.600 Therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to 537 00:52:04.600 --> 00:52:08.680 thy poor, and to thy needy in thy land. 538 00:52:08.680 --> 00:52:11.840 There's a similar statement about the poor in the New Testament. 539 00:52:11.840 --> 00:52:16.720 While Jesus was in the town of Bethany before his crucifixion, a woman anointed his head 540 00:52:16.720 --> 00:52:19.000 with some costly ointment. 541 00:52:19.000 --> 00:52:23.080 When some of his disciples became indignant because they felt that the ointment could 542 00:52:23.080 --> 00:52:28.600 have been sold and given to the poor instead of being wasted, the Lord disagreed and said 543 00:52:28.600 --> 00:52:31.400 that the woman had wrought a good work. 544 00:52:31.400 --> 00:52:36.240 But then he added, for ye have the poor with you always, and whence whoever ye will ye 545 00:52:36.240 --> 00:52:40.960 may do them good, but me ye have not always. 546 00:52:40.960 --> 00:52:44.520 In this we can draw two conclusions. 547 00:52:44.520 --> 00:52:48.400 One is that there are some things more important than supporting the poor. 548 00:52:48.400 --> 00:52:51.560 Christ did not come to eradicate poverty. 549 00:52:51.560 --> 00:52:55.360 Having compassion on the poor is no ticket to heaven. 550 00:52:55.360 --> 00:53:02.600 It might be a ticket to being a successful democratic senator, but it won't secure you 551 00:53:02.600 --> 00:53:06.920 a cool place in the afterlife. 552 00:53:06.920 --> 00:53:11.040 Those in the New Testament are admonished to do other good deeds besides providing for 553 00:53:11.040 --> 00:53:12.540 the poor. 554 00:53:12.540 --> 00:53:18.280 These responsibilities include supporting widows, loving one's neighbor as oneself, 555 00:53:18.280 --> 00:53:23.480 doing good to all men, distributing to the necessity of the saints, being hospitable, 556 00:53:23.480 --> 00:53:28.240 looking on the things of others, being content with food and raiment, and maintaining good 557 00:53:28.240 --> 00:53:29.480 works. 558 00:53:29.480 --> 00:53:36.100 It is the individual Christian that is to voluntarily perform these charitable works. 559 00:53:36.100 --> 00:53:39.460 Not some nanny state that feigns omniscience. 560 00:53:39.460 --> 00:53:46.380 A Christian who fails to perform his responsibilities answers to God, not to the state, and not 561 00:53:46.380 --> 00:53:48.580 to any other Christian. 562 00:53:48.580 --> 00:53:52.380 The second thing is that relief for the poor is voluntary. 563 00:53:52.380 --> 00:53:57.020 Christians in the New Testament are admonished to remember the poor, just as they are instructed 564 00:53:57.020 --> 00:53:59.740 to do many other good deeds. 565 00:53:59.740 --> 00:54:05.060 But what could be more unchristian than to not provide for the needs of the poor out 566 00:54:05.060 --> 00:54:27.060 The Bible teaches that it is more blessed to give than receive, but it also teaches individual freedom and individual responsibility. 567 00:54:27.060 --> 00:54:31.060 Another subject to examine is the nature of the merchant. 568 00:54:31.060 --> 00:54:36.620 Contrary to the unwarranted suspicion of merchants that we find throughout history, including 569 00:54:36.620 --> 00:54:43.100 amongst some sectors of Christianity, the Bible nowhere condemns mercantile activity 570 00:54:43.100 --> 00:54:46.340 as an action or a profession. 571 00:54:46.340 --> 00:54:54.700 A virtuous woman is even compared to the merchant ships that bring food from afar. 572 00:54:54.700 --> 00:55:00.980 The Church Father Augustine not only correctly pointed out how merchants perform a beneficial 573 00:55:00.980 --> 00:55:06.980 by transporting goods over great distances and selling them to the consumer. 574 00:55:06.980 --> 00:55:11.980 But also that deceit and fraud were not endemic to trading. 575 00:55:11.980 --> 00:55:17.980 After all, even shoemakers and farmers are also capable of lies and perjuries. 576 00:55:17.980 --> 00:55:23.980 Christians, of course, are not to lie, cheat or steal in any of their business transactions. 577 00:55:23.980 --> 00:55:30.980 They are to walk honestly when it comes to unbelievers and provide things honest in the sight of all men. 578 00:55:30.980 --> 00:55:34.980 Furthermore, they are commanded to not be slothful in business. 579 00:55:34.980 --> 00:55:44.980 It is true that those who said, today or tomorrow we will go into such a city and continue there a year and buy and sell and get gain, were condemned. 580 00:55:44.980 --> 00:55:51.980 But this is only because they were boasting and didn't add, if the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that. 581 00:55:51.980 --> 00:55:58.980 Jesus commends getting gain by means of trade in his parables of the talents and the pounds. 582 00:55:58.980 --> 00:56:04.980 Yes, Christ did drive the money changers out of the temple with the words, 583 00:56:04.980 --> 00:56:07.980 make not my father's house and house of merchandise, 584 00:56:07.980 --> 00:56:13.980 but only a blockhead could get from that that he was opposed to a genuine house of merchandise. 585 00:56:13.980 --> 00:56:19.980 The historical aversion to moneylenders was certainly not derived from the New Testament. 586 00:56:19.980 --> 00:56:23.980 Usury is only mentioned twice and in a favorable sense. 587 00:56:23.980 --> 00:56:27.980 This, of course, does not negate the principle found in the Proverbs 588 00:56:27.980 --> 00:56:30.980 that the borrower is servant to the lender. 589 00:56:30.980 --> 00:56:34.980 Because those who abdicate some kind of intervention in a transaction 590 00:56:34.980 --> 00:56:38.980 to ensure that the buyer receives a just price 591 00:56:38.980 --> 00:56:42.980 usually implicate the seller in some way. 592 00:56:42.980 --> 00:56:47.980 I thought this proverb of Solomon that mentions a shrewd buyer quite interesting. 593 00:56:47.980 --> 00:56:54.980 It is not, it is not, saith the buyer, but when he has gone his way, then he boasts it. 594 00:56:54.980 --> 00:56:59.980 Employment in the Bible is based on the right to freely contract. 595 00:56:59.980 --> 00:57:06.980 In the parable of the vineyard, a landowner contracts with some laborers early in the morning for a day's work, 596 00:57:06.980 --> 00:57:12.980 then another group later in the morning, and then two other groups at different times in the afternoon. 597 00:57:12.980 --> 00:57:18.100 Finally, when there is but an hour in the day remaining, the landowner contracts with 598 00:57:18.100 --> 00:57:20.100 a fifth group. 599 00:57:20.100 --> 00:57:25.980 At day's end, when it was time to get paid, all the workers were paid the same amount. 600 00:57:25.980 --> 00:57:30.220 The first group of laborers then murmured, because even though they agreed to a certain 601 00:57:30.220 --> 00:57:34.860 wage, the eleventh-hour workforce received the same amount. 602 00:57:34.860 --> 00:57:38.460 But what was the landowner's reply to the first group? 603 00:57:38.460 --> 00:57:41.460 The Bible tells us that he answered one of them and said, 604 00:57:41.460 --> 00:57:47.260 Friend, I do thee no wrong, didst not thou agree with me for a penny? 605 00:57:47.260 --> 00:57:49.420 Take that thine is and go thy way. 606 00:57:49.420 --> 00:57:53.100 I will give unto this last even as unto thee. 607 00:57:53.100 --> 00:57:56.360 Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? 608 00:57:56.360 --> 00:57:59.240 Is thine eye evil because I am good? 609 00:57:59.240 --> 00:58:05.540 I suppose that the first group of workers could form a union and strike for higher wages. 610 00:58:05.540 --> 00:58:12.040 Although there is nothing wrong with collective bargaining per se, in a real free market and 611 00:58:12.040 --> 00:58:17.820 without government protection for unions, employers could freely fire employees who 612 00:58:17.820 --> 00:58:19.760 refuse to work. 613 00:58:19.760 --> 00:58:24.440 It may not be in their best interest to do so, but there is no reason that they shouldn't 614 00:58:24.440 --> 00:58:26.580 have that option. 615 00:58:26.580 --> 00:58:33.940 The biblical solution to the problem of unemployment is a simple one, work. 616 00:58:33.940 --> 00:58:38.120 If a man will not work, then he should not eat. 617 00:58:38.120 --> 00:58:44.300 If a man provides not for his own house, then he is to be counted as worse than an infidel. 618 00:58:44.300 --> 00:58:48.740 But a man should also labor to give to him that is in need. 619 00:58:48.740 --> 00:58:54.520 This should not, however, be confused with the Marxist dictum that many Americans think 620 00:58:54.520 --> 00:58:57.020 appears in the Constitution. 621 00:58:57.020 --> 00:59:02.340 From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. 622 00:59:02.340 --> 00:59:09.780 Marx, or from whomever he stole the precept, got his idea from the Book of Acts in the New Testament. 623 00:59:09.780 --> 00:59:14.180 There we read that the early Christians, because of an impending famine, 624 00:59:14.180 --> 00:59:21.180 every man according to his ability determined to send relief under the brethren which dealt in Judea. 625 00:59:21.180 --> 00:59:25.680 We also read that the early Christians in Jerusalem had all things common 626 00:59:25.680 --> 00:59:33.120 and sold houses and lands with the money being distributed to every man according as he had need. 627 00:59:33.120 --> 00:59:39.280 Only someone ignorant of what communism is would make the mistake of equating these actions 628 00:59:39.280 --> 00:59:47.680 with state ownership of property and the means of production. As Mises wrote about this in socialism, 629 00:59:47.680 --> 00:59:57.480 It is a communism of consumption goods, not the means of production, a community of consumers, not of producers. 630 00:59:57.480 --> 01:00:07.680 Marx was very selective with his scripture, for in the parable of the talents, the talents are given to every man according to his several ability. 631 01:00:07.680 --> 01:00:17.080 There is also no evidence that this radical degree of Christian charity was ever practiced outside of Jerusalem, or was to serve as a model for future churches. 632 01:00:17.080 --> 01:00:27.080 and besides this is charity not communism and as such was purely voluntary. Ask someone in the Soviet Union if he could opt out of the system. 633 01:00:27.080 --> 01:00:31.080 Two specific cases are recorded that make this clear. 634 01:00:31.080 --> 01:00:35.080 Barnabas sold some land and gave the money he received to the Apostles. 635 01:00:35.080 --> 01:00:43.080 Ananias did likewise but lied about how much he sold his possession for and kept back part of the price. 636 01:00:43.080 --> 01:00:47.880 He was subsequently rebuked by the Apostles and punished by God. 637 01:00:47.880 --> 01:00:51.280 What we should note, however, is that he was told, 638 01:00:51.280 --> 01:00:54.380 while as it remained, was it not thine own? 639 01:00:54.380 --> 01:00:58.180 And after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? 640 01:00:58.180 --> 01:01:04.480 The right of private ownership and control of real or personal property 641 01:01:04.480 --> 01:01:08.080 is both absolute and biblical. 642 01:01:08.080 --> 01:01:11.880 A man that plants a vineyard is entitled to the fruit thereof. 643 01:01:11.880 --> 01:01:15.580 A man that feeds a flock is entitled to the milk thereof. 644 01:01:15.580 --> 01:01:21.180 A husbandman is entitled to be first partaker of his fruits. 645 01:01:21.180 --> 01:01:26.280 Laissez-faire is natural, moral and biblical. 646 01:01:26.280 --> 01:01:30.180 People exchange goods in a market economy to their mutual advantage. 647 01:01:30.180 --> 01:01:36.480 Each party to an exchange values what he receives more than what he exchanges for it. 648 01:01:36.480 --> 01:01:41.480 Both parties are better off after an exchange than they were before the exchange. 649 01:01:41.480 --> 01:01:49.480 In a free market, suppliers compete with suppliers and buyers compete with buyers. Suppliers do not compete with buyers. 650 01:01:49.480 --> 01:01:57.480 The only exchanges that result in winners and losers are Christmas gift exchanges between parents and children. 651 01:01:57.480 --> 01:02:00.480 But even that is a voluntary loss. 652 01:02:00.480 --> 01:02:06.480 Competition for business between suppliers reduces prices, which is to the advantage of the consumer, 653 01:02:06.480 --> 01:02:29.480 While the bidding of consumers against each other for goods raises prices, which is to the advantage of the supplier, the free market allows suppliers who naturally want the highest price they can get for their goods and consumers who wish to acquire those goods at the lowest possible price to come together in harmony. There is no such thing as market failure. 654 01:02:29.480 --> 01:02:36.440 Why do people think it ludicrous to say that the market has failed to provide everyone 655 01:02:36.440 --> 01:02:42.440 in the United States with a new Cadillac every year, but not that it is just as absurd to 656 01:02:42.440 --> 01:02:47.540 say that the market has failed to provide everyone with adequate health insurance? 657 01:02:47.540 --> 01:02:55.120 The market facilitates exchange, fosters efficiency, provides incentives for productivity, requires 658 01:02:55.120 --> 01:03:01.360 There is no government oversight and is perfectly compatible with biblical Christianity. 659 01:03:01.360 --> 01:03:04.320 Free exchange is fair exchange. 660 01:03:04.320 --> 01:03:06.800 Free trade is fair trade. 661 01:03:06.800 --> 01:03:11.400 The just price is the freely agreed upon price. 662 01:03:11.400 --> 01:03:16.300 The only problem with the free market in the United States is that it is not free. 663 01:03:16.300 --> 01:03:20.920 Not only is government intervention the rule rather than the exception, even so-called 664 01:03:20.920 --> 01:03:26.320 Defenders of the Free Market regularly call for more government oversight, like the former 665 01:03:26.320 --> 01:03:30.720 chief editorial writer at the Wall Street Journal, who made these two statements in 666 01:03:30.720 --> 01:03:34.920 the course of defending the morality of the market. 667 01:03:34.920 --> 01:03:41.440 In theory, we can think of many ways in which legitimate markets need to be curbed. 668 01:03:41.440 --> 01:03:46.540 Government regulation and intervention may be necessary in many parts of our lives. 669 01:03:46.540 --> 01:03:52.860 With defenders of the free market like this, who needs enemies? Government interference 670 01:03:52.860 --> 01:03:58.540 in the market cannot make the market more competitive. It can only distort the market. 671 01:03:58.540 --> 01:04:04.840 Attempts to regulate markets by the government always have unintended consequences that are 672 01:04:04.840 --> 01:04:10.760 often worse than the problems that government regulations were meant to cure. Although he 673 01:04:10.760 --> 01:04:16.160 was writing against the government's foreign interventions, what Arthur Silber said applies 674 01:04:16.160 --> 01:04:18.880 as to its economic interventions as well. 675 01:04:18.880 --> 01:04:22.960 In fact, he sounds here just like Mises. 676 01:04:22.960 --> 01:04:25.360 Intervention always leads to more intervention. 677 01:04:25.360 --> 01:04:30.000 The first intervention leads to unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences, which are 678 01:04:30.000 --> 01:04:34.280 then used as the justification for still further intervention. 679 01:04:34.280 --> 01:04:39.640 That intervention, in turn, leads to still more unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences, 680 01:04:39.640 --> 01:04:44.620 which are then used as yet another justification for still further intervention. 681 01:04:44.620 --> 01:04:49.620 The process can go on indefinitely, and the ultimate consequences are always disastrous 682 01:04:49.620 --> 01:04:51.860 in the extreme. 683 01:04:51.860 --> 01:04:56.680 Our cry is not greed, profit, or materialism. 684 01:04:56.680 --> 01:04:59.120 It is simply laissez-faire. 685 01:04:59.120 --> 01:05:03.380 All we want is for the government to stay out of the market. 686 01:05:03.380 --> 01:05:09.500 We don't need a nanny state any more than we need an omnipotent state. 687 01:05:09.500 --> 01:05:11.180 We don't need your usury laws. 688 01:05:11.180 --> 01:05:12.760 We don't need your trade laws. 689 01:05:12.760 --> 01:05:14.720 We don't need your labor laws. 690 01:05:14.720 --> 01:05:16.840 We don't need your antitrust laws. 691 01:05:16.840 --> 01:05:18.840 We don't need your price controls. 692 01:05:18.840 --> 01:05:20.900 We don't need your regulations. 693 01:05:20.900 --> 01:05:23.880 We don't need your wealth redistribution schemes. 694 01:05:23.880 --> 01:05:30.020 And we certainly don't need any Christian economist defending any of these things as 695 01:05:30.020 --> 01:05:33.480 if they had any biblical basis. 696 01:05:33.480 --> 01:05:39.160 Economic myths die hard, and especially the myth of the just price. 697 01:05:39.160 --> 01:05:44.840 Economic ignorance is great and extends to the highest levels of society. 698 01:05:44.840 --> 01:05:50.960 Just look at the recent crop of presidential candidates or Congress' latest economic stimulus 699 01:05:50.960 --> 01:05:52.400 package. 700 01:05:52.400 --> 01:05:59.360 In the tradition of the Mises Institute and its namesake, we must continue our labor of 701 01:05:59.360 --> 01:06:01.720 economic education.