The big news this week is actually
for next week: Michael D. Greaney, CESJ’s Director of Research, is scheduled to
appear on the Eternal Word Television Network’s show EWTN Live! with Father
Mitch Pacwa, S.J. In the expanded
ownership arena, we kick off the year with the SECURE Act, that puts more power
in the hands of participants in qualified retirement plans:
• Retirement SECURE-ity. As reported by the National Center for Employee Ownership, the newly passed Setting Every Community Up for Retirement
Enhancement Act of 2019 (the “SECURE Act” . . . how long did it take them to
think that up?), was signed into law December 20, 2019. It makes a number of changes to retirement
plans, mostly 401(k) plans. One provision that applies to all plans, including
ESOPs, is that required minimum distributions (RMDs) for former plan
participants who still have accounts now do not have to start until those
participants reach age 72. Before the SECURE Act, former participants
would need to begin receiving RMDs after reaching age 70½. The change only
applies to those not aged 70½ by the end of 2019. The next step, of course, would be to pass the Capital Homestead
Act that allows participants to retain assets in a tax-deferred trust and
distribute only the income as taxable to the recipient.
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| Caesar Octavius ("Augustus" was a title) |
• Mao, Xi, and Augustus. On December
30, 2019, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Chinese Politburo
granted president Xi Jinping the accolade renmin lingxiu, “people’s
leader,” similar to one associated with Mao.
(“As China’s Troubles Grow, Xi Collects a Special Title,” 12/30/19,
A-7.) Interestingly, the Wall Street
Journal claims that the label carries no additional power, but that is to
misunderstand the politics of power. As
so many dictators of the twentieth century discovered, it is not necessarily
official titles and positions that convey power, but what someone does with it. Stalin, for example, was “only” Secretary of
the Communist Party, not head of state in the Soviet Union. Augustus Caesar seems to have been the first
to realize that he could exercise the powers of a dictator without actually
being officially named head of state (that came after he gained power). Fortunately for Rome, Augustus came about as
close to a benevolent ruler as it is possible to get, and he was always careful
to observe the outward forms of republican government, but — as a number of
historians have gone to great length to explain — he had the power he wanted or
needed without the official titles.
• Dignity, Freedom, and Power. What with the holidays and a
sudden spate of last-minute details, Dignity, Freedom, and Power — the
short book on economic personalism — has been delayed again. Currently the plan is to have review copies
released by the end of January with bulk sales available at the same time.
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| EWTN Live! with Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J. |
• EWTN Live! with Father Mitch Pacwa.
Michael D. Greaney, CESJ’s Director of Research, is scheduled to appear
on the Eternal Word Television Network’s show, EWTN Live! with host
Father Mitch Pacwa, S.J., to talk about Mike’s book, Ten Battles Every
Catholic Should Know (2018). While
in Alabama for the show, Mike may also tape a segment of Bookmark with
Doug Keck, depending on scheduling.
While EWTN is a Catholic religious broadcasting network and Mike’s book
is ostensibly for Catholics (although some reviewers have said it is mistitled
as everyone should find it of interest), the show(s) should find an audience
far beyond Catholics alone.
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| Daniel Webster "Power follows property." |
• The Battle for Democracy?. Also in the Washington Post of
12/30/19, an article, “A Turning Point in the Battle for Democracy” (A-15)
asserted that a number of instances of voters reacting against or outright
rejecting anyone whose understanding of democracy differs from that of the Washington
Post means that “democracy” is starting a comeback. One of the problems, however, is that
“democracy” is defined strictly in terms of voting power, with little if any
appreciation of the economic power that makes voting power effective. In most cases, frankly, changing rulers
without changing patterns of capital ownership simply means somebody else is
doing to the voter the same as was done before.
As Phaedrus said 2,000 years ago, In principatu commutando saepius,
nil praeter nomen mutant pauperes — When changing rulers, often the only
thing that changes for the poor is the name of the ruler. As Daniel Webster noted in 1820 in words that
apply equally well to 2020, “Power naturally and necessarily follows property.” Without the economic power to sustain
political power, it’s not going to make much difference, ultimately, who’s in
charge.
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| Need I say more? |
• Shop online and support CESJ’s work! Did you know that by making
your purchases through the Amazon Smile
program, Amazon will make a contribution to CESJ? Here’s how: First, go to https://smile.amazon.com/. Next, sign in to your Amazon account. (If you don’t have an account with Amazon,
you can create one by clicking on the tiny little link below the “Sign in using
our secure server” button.) Once you
have signed into your account, you need to select CESJ as your charity — and
you have to be careful to do it exactly this way: in the
space provided for “Or select your own charitable organization” type “Center for Economic and Social Justice
Arlington.” If you type anything
else, you will either get no results or more than you want to sift through. Once you’ve typed (or copied and pasted) “Center for Economic and Social Justice
Arlington” into the space provided, hit “Select” — and you will be taken to
the Amazon shopping site, all ready to go.
• Blog Readership. We have had visitors from 26 different
countries and 39 states and provinces in the United States and Canada to this
blog over the past week. Most visitors are from the United States, Canada, India,
Spain and Argentina. The most popular
postings this past week in descending order were “News
from the Network, Vol. 12, No. 52,” “Just
Third Way for Local Government,” “An
Unimportant Shift in Meaning,” “Good
Upon ’Change,” and “How
to Have Your Cake and Eat It.”
Those are the happenings for this
week, at least those that we know about.
If you have an accomplishment that you think should be listed, send us a
note about it at mgreaney [at] cesj [dot] org, and we’ll see that it gets into
the next “issue.” Due to imprudent
language on the part of some commentators, we removed temptation and disabled
comments.
#30#