Full Participation

Say’s Law of Markets is usually summarized as “Production equals income, therefore, supply generates its own demand, and demand, its own supply.  Unless, however, you understand or even are just generally familiar with the full explanation of Say’s Law, it’s likely that you will either misunderstand it or reject it outright.

JTW Podcast: Mortimer Adler on the (U.S.) Constitution

This week we feature “Great Books” philosopher Mortimer J. Adler speaking on the United States Constitution of 1787.  Adler taught “Philosophy of Law” at the University of Chicago law school, and William Winslow Crosskey (Politics and the Constitution in the History of the United States, 1953) taught “Constitutional Law” there.

News from the Network, Vol. 14, No. 34

We hate to keep sounding the same note all the time, but many of the problems the world is currently facing would not even be a blip on the radar if the Economic Democracy Act had been passed when it was first proposed, whether then-Governor Reagan’s call for an “Industrial Homestead Act,’ or even Louis Kelso’s 1967 Accelerated Capital Expansion Act.  No, it’s not a panacea; we’d still have problems, but they would be of a more manageable size.  Until then, however:

Redefining Humanity

As we saw in the previous posting on this subject, redefining a natural right means that you are, in effect, redefining what it means to be human.  That’s because natural law is based on human nature, so redefining its principles effectively redefines what it means to be human.

The Problem of Private Property

As we saw in the previous posting on this subject, quite a few people in the world don’t really know the legal definition of “person” . . . although they probably think they do.  That can cause one or two (billion) problems.

The Problem of the Human Person

If you want to develop a solution to what’s going on in the world today, you have to start with the human person.  If something — such as a “Great Reset” — does not tend to the good of a human being as a human being, then it cannot be said to be good.

JTW Podcast: Dr. Robert H.A. Ashford on Capital Ownership

This particular podcast comes with a little caveat.  We agree with what Dr. Robert Ashford says, but not necessarily how he says it, e.g., he uses the term “capitalism” when we prefer “economic personalism.”  Other than that, you won’t find too many differences, so this audio recording should be of great interest, at least the first part:

News from the Network, Vol. 14, No. 33

What with everything else that’s going on, it seems that the politicians can’t wait to see how fast they can drive the entire world into chaos and bankruptcy . . . not necessarily in that order:

Economic Personalism is Applied Solidarism

One of the problems with modern life is the extreme compartmentalization that has accompanied the development of what G.K. Chesterton called “the Double Mind of Man.”  What Chesterton meant is the not-so-modern practice of accepting contradiction.

Solidarism, Personalism, and Social Justice

If you want to trigger a violent discussion in pretty much any forum, you don’t need to drag in politics, religion, or even the Great Pumpkin.  No all you need is to mention social justice.  Regardless how you define it, somebody else will tell you that you’re wrong and everything you say is a lie, not to mention stupid, vindictive, ignorant, stupid, vicious, stupid, malicious, stupid and just plain stupid.  And that’s when they’re being polite about it.

The Rise and Development of Solidarism

A short time ago we looked over the website of an organization ostensibly dedicated to promoting solidarity and solidarism as the solution to the ills of the world.  Intrigued, we looked the website over carefully.  After a bit, we noticed something distinctly odd.  The organization talked a lot about solidarity . . . but didn’t define it anywhere!  We won't embarrass them by posting a link or revealing their Secret Identity.

JTW Podcast: The Four Pillars of a Just Market Economy

What are the four things that, in our opinion, an economy needs in order to be considered just?  You can probably guess the first one right away: widespread private property in capital.  And the other three? 1) A limited economic role for the State, 2) free and open markets, and 3) restoration of the rights 0of private property:

News from the Network, Vol. 14, No. 32

We could probably sum up all of today’s news items (except our lament that LeVar Burton was not selected as host of Jeopardy) just by saying that the money system is screwed up.  Since that would hardly fill trhe page, here are some specific reasons we have for saying that:

The Magic of Future Savings

If you want to baffle and outrage both socialists and capitalists — kin under the skin more than either group realizes — tell them that it is possible to have expanded capital ownership without either redefining ownership or redistributing what belongs to others.  Socialists will bellow that you cannot have widespread ownership without changing the meaning of ownership, while capitalists will shriek that the only way others can own anything is to take it from them.

Abolishing Private Property

In the previous posting on this subject, we closed by noting that at some point the noted lawyer-economist Louis O. Kelso asked himself the questions (probably not in these exact words), “If advancing technology makes such superabundance possible, why is it essential for people to have employers to pay them wages for labor that is not necessary for production?”

The Expanded Ownership Revolution

One of the many paradoxes involved in the Great Reset and similar proposals has to do with human nature and the natural law.  As we saw in the previous posting on this subject, despite centuries of failure adherents insist that the abolition of private property and redistribution will work if we just manage to change human nature, try harder, and commit sufficient resources to the effort.

JTW Podcast: Adler on the Six Great Ideas: Truth

Today’s podcast we get to hear Mortimer Adler on what truth is.  The short answer, which you can hear about a minute and a half into the video, is “Truth consists in the agreement of what we think and what is in the world, what is real.”  Obviously, this comes into serious conflict with all the people who think that we can make our own truth and force it on others if we just have enough power over them:

News from the Network, Vol. 14, No. 31

If there is one word to describe the current world situation, it is “surreal.”  One of the problems has been that for more than two-hundred years the idea has been gaining ground that “humanity” (an abstraction) is far more important than humans.  That sort of thinking is the basis of capitalism, socialism, “ultrasupernaturalism” (what Msgr. Ronald Knox defined as an excess of charity that causes disunity), and “New Age” thinking.  Many people today think they can create truth rather than work to discover it.  It’s so much easier to impose your created truth on others rather than do the hard work of conforming to reality.  Maybe that’s why people still haven’t caught on to the Just Third Way . . . it’s too much work.

A Systematic Diffusion of Power

Ironically, it is not out of the realm of possibility that had Theodore Roosevelt won the 1912 U.S. Presidential election, World War I might never have occurred.  It might also have occurred to Judge Peter S. Grosscup and the Rough Rider that when the Federal Reserve was finally established in 1914, here was the desperately needed source of financing that could open access to ownership by all Americans of America’s vast corporate wealth without the necessity of past savings and without redistribution or taxation.

Something Missing

Sometimes we’re tempted to paraphrase Vince Lombardi (even if he didn’t actually say it) and say that money isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.  We’d be completely wrong, of course, but money — properly understood — is such a key element of any economy that it’s easy to make that kind of mistake.

Is There a “Third Way”?

As we saw in the previous posting on this subject, we believe it is a fundamental principle of economic personalism that every human being is a person, and as such should be both a producer or creator and a consumer — a binary relationship, integral to personalism itself.  The right to consume is rarely questioned (at least out loud), but what doesn’t seem to cross people’s minds is the need for everyone to be productive.  Each person should have access to the means of employing both labor and capital to do so.

JTW Podcast: Review of Adler’s “The Great Ideas”

Here is a video review of Mortimer Adler’s “the Great Ideas” books by “Andrew the Red.”  There’s some good stuff here about the state of education today and how difficult it is to get an actual education: