JTW Podcast: Economic Democracy

Of course, the first thing that pops into your head on hearing the words “Economic Democracy” is socialism of some variety or other, but that is not the case with the Just Third Way of Economic Personalism, which is based solidly on the natural right of every person to own capital.  Socialism, as you might know, is defined as the abolition of private property in capital — so a system based on widespread private ownership of capital cannot be called socialism.

News from the Network, Vol. 19, No. 16

Again the news items we’ve collected (entirely without prejudice, of course) graphically illustrate what has increasingly become the absolute need for something like the Economic Democracy Act as soon as possible — so why not now?

The Marriage Tax Penalty

Just in time for “Tax Day,” we have a posting on . . . taxation!  How original!  Today we are taking on the so-called “marriage penalty” that kicks in when people get hitched, specifically, what has been going on in Switzerland.  It hasn’t been getting a lot of (or any) play on this side of the pond, but the Swiss are “equalizing” what people have become accustomed to calling “genders.”

JTW Podcast: Mike Wallace Interviews Robert Maynard Hutchins

Somehow, we missed this video when searching for videos by or about Robert Maynard Hutchins, one of the people behind the “Great Books” program with the goal of reviving and restoring American education — related, not coincidentally, to CESJ’s “Justice University” program.

News from the Network, Vol. 19, No. 15

Not too much new in the “news” this week, but perhaps there are a few items of interest.  Frankly, it’s difficult to know what tack to take in putting together the news items every week because that requires some idea of what the powers-that-be are likely to do, and in the current economic and political atmosphere, that is very difficult to figure out.  One thing remains constant, however: if we want things to change, we should adopt the Economic Democracy Act as soon as possible:

Democratizing Finance

    One of the goals of the Economic Democracy Act is to “democratize” ownership of capital.  By this we do not mean the collectivist “The People” own (meaning everything is owned by the State and controlled by whoever holds political power), the individualist “Democratic Capitalism” (meaning almost everything is owned by a relatively few private individuals holding economic power), or the collective-individualist/individual-collectivist “Servile State” (meaning virtually everything is owned or controlled by a private-public sector economic-political elite holding both economic and political power).

JTW Podcast: How to Find Good Books to Read

    Last week we looked at a Beginner’s Guide to the Classics — books, that is.  Today, assuming you are all agog to start the process of reading all the good stuff, we present “Great Books” Professor Andrew Moore’s suggestions as to how to find the good stuff:

News from the Network, Vol. 19, No. 14

At the risk of sounding redundant, this week’s news items differ only in detail from those of previous weeks.  The only antidote is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act as soon as possible:

The Monster from SpaceX

No, this is not the title of a 1950’s low-budget sci-fi flick.  Nor is it a cheap commercial from the, er, 1950s comparing what someone is advertising with “Brand X.”  No, it’s just some commentary about the proposed IPO — that’s “Initial Public Offering” for those of us not up on the lingo of financial markets — of “SpaceX” for “Space Exploration Technologies Corporation,” the rather unimaginatively named private American aerospace manufacturer and space transportation company.