Sometimes Home Sweet Home Blinds Us To What Is Unbiblical

One of the troubles with growing up in America back when Christianity was the dominant religion is that things that are considered to be American were also considered to be Christian. And that kind of thinking was not invented by Baby Boomers like myself or by our parents, it existed back during America's founding. Even the, before America became a nation, many Christian European settlers viewed themselves collectively as the New Israel and Native Americans as the Canaanites. But perhaps what those early settlers were really demonstrating, as is demonstrated by all of us some of the time, is that religion sometimes becomes the conduit to self-worship rather than the worship of some heavenly god.

And so we come to a short article written by Michael J. Kruger (click here for a short bio) from Reformed Theological Seminary in Charlotte, NC.  The article serves as a review of a book that defends capitalism from charges that it is based on greed. Of course, no Christian should want to encourage greed in any way, shape, or form. And so no American Christian could freely participate in an economic system that is based on greed.

Kruger's article is a short review of a book by Jay W. Richards called Money, Greed, And God: Why Capitalism Is The Solution And Not The Problem (click here for the book's website). Kruger's article provides a brief review of why capitalism is to be considered a remedy from God for the world (click here for the article). I am not sure how well the article summarizes the arguments made in the book, but those summaries  are shallow and unconvincing.

The following claims from the book are briefly explained in the article:

• The fact that individuals in a capitalistic society happen to be greedy, does not mean capitalism is actually based on greed
• There is a difference between selfishness and self-interest
• Thus economic exchanges in a capitalistic system are mutually beneficial
• Capitalism does the best job of channeling selfishness for good ends
• Capitalism actually encourages generosity

Kruger's first claim is true. The existence of greedy people in a capitalistic society does not imply that capitalism is based on greed. At the same time, what should we say when greed is growing? Today's American capitalism is not the same as the capitalism I grew up with. Back then, we were under the Bretton-Woods system where the government was more in control over parts of the economy than it is today. The Bretton-Woods system took effect shortly after WW II and lasted through most of the 1970s. During most of that time period, growth in prosperity was generally egalitarian across all economic classes. 

The form of capitalism being practiced today is neoliberalism. Its focus is to free up business from government controls on the market and trade. Here we should note that since the latter part of the 1970s, wealth disparity has grown between a number of groups. That disparity has continued through today so that the top 1% of those with wealth have, comparatively speaking, as much wealth  as the 1% did just prior to the Great Depression (click here).

That growth in wealth disparity has also produced a growth in a political power disparity. Some have reclassified America from being a democracy to being an oligarchy (click here for an example). An oligarchy is the rule of a small group of the wealthy. And the study cited in the article just linked to based its assessment on the high percentage of governmental policies that were based on serving the interests of those with wealth vs those policies that were based on serving the interests of the general public. For the growth in wealth disparity have given those who earn the more disposable funds to buy influence over government.

Still, what is happening in the USA doesn't prove that capitalism fosters greed. But consider that the maximization of profit ethic, which is an ethic used to fuel economic growth, is such a basic part of American capitalism because it serves major investors. And we should also note that a major part of our economy consists of investing though the stock market. Thus, it seems safe to conclude that at least American capitalism is based on greed. Here we should note that just because American capitalism is based on greed doesn't imply that every participant in American capitalism is greedy.

Next, Kruger states that there is a difference between selfishness and self-interest. But he doesn't adequately explain that statement. Rather, he makes it seem as if there is no connection between selfishness and self-interest.

He goes on to say that we all make decisions based on self-interest and he is right. Does that mean we are all selfish? To answer that question, it might be important to see the relationship between selfishness and self-interest. After all, isn't self-interest involved when making selfish decisions?

We might want to consider the following to explain the relationship between selfishness and self-interest. The more dominant a role that self-interest plays in our decision making, the more selfish our decisions become. Thus, we might define selfishness by the degree in which our decisions are based on self-interest over the interest of others. If self-interest is the one factor in making decisions, then aren't our decisions  selfish ones? But the more we consider the interests of others, the more balanced our decisions become so that they become less and less selfish. And when the interests of others outweigh self-interest in our decisions, then we are starting to talk about being sacrificial.

Kruger's third claim is that the purchase of goods in a capitalist system is mutually beneficial. But is that always the case? Aren't consumers and even vendors ever cheated on a significant scale? In addition, this view of capitalism where we focus on the buyers and sellers of goods reduces the stakeholders of capitalist ventures to just 2 parties. And such violates the traditional business definition of the term 'stakeholder.' That traditional definition states that a stakeholder is anyone who is impacted by the business. Thus, the current focus on just the buyers and sellers leaves out the community in which a business operates, its employees, its own vendors, the communities in which the employees live, the government since the government receives taxes and provides infrastructure and services, and the environment. That certainly is not an exhaustive list of the stakeholders that most, if not all business operations have, but it gives us an idea of who is all involved in a simple business transaction between buyer and a seller.

Kruger's fourth claim undoes his first two. Why? Because his fourth claim acknowledges the prevalence of selfishness in the capitalist system. It also acts as a siren song for those who embrace capitalism. For it says that capitalism is able to practice judo on the selfishness that exists. It does that through the free market. And what aficionados of capitalism want to believe is that one does not have be responsible for the interest of others because the free market will make positive use of one's own selfishness. Unfortunately, such has not been the case during for decades during neoliberalism since wealth disparity has continually grown and produced a growing power disparity. And that growing wealth disparity has put many non-wealthy people from both the middle and lower economic classes on financially volatile situations.

Finally Kruger claims that capitalism encourages generosity. The grounds for that claim are as follows: 1) America is the most generous nation in the world; and 2) there is an 'inverse relationship' that exists in charitable giving and the amount of taxes one must pay. What is sad here, besides the baseless implication between that inverse relationship and the claim that capitalism encourages generosity, is that Kruger uses the financial bottom line to judge generosity. Kruger who is the president of a conservative Christian seminary uses the financial bottom line to judge generosity.

If Kruger had remembered how Jesus described the poor widow who only contributed two small copper coins (click here), he would have used a different standard to judge generosity. That is because Jesus described that poor widow as giving more than anyone else because of the percentage of what she gave was in relation to what she had. It is easy to look generous when giving millions of dollars when one has billions of dollars. And that gift of millions of dollars often makes us look the other way as to how those billions of dollars were gained. Perhaps a real measure of generosity for one who would be rich would be not to become a millionaire or billionaire so that many of those who work for the companies one owns could pay higher wages to all of their workers.

I am not sure how deep Richards' book, which is the subject of Kruger's article, is. But one thing is for sure, Kruger's review of the book is almost disingenuously shallow. And it is that shallowness that strongly indicates that Kruger's view of capitalism is more guided by having grown up in America than by using the Scriptures and reason.