By now the Pilgrims’ disastrous experiment with collectivism in Plymouth, Massachusetts, is well-known, in free market circles if not among the young. The story has been printed and popularized – Rush Limbaugh even recites it annually on his radio program. However, trade merce played another, lesser-known role in the first Thanksgiving – and America’s founding, history, and self-definition. Public schools still teach the familiar history of Thanksgiving: that American Indians taught starving Pilgrims useful practices like fertilization. A grateful Governor...

As Americans made their final arrangements for Thanksgiving, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond unveiled the annual Budget on Wednesday. Here’s what you need to know. The Budget will spend a total of £809 billion ($1 trillion U.S.), adding £41 billion to the national debt. It makes two policy changes to address the housing shortage, the most important issue to young Brits. Hammond pledged £15.3 billion to build 300,000 homes a year – but none on the so-called greenbelt,...

Economic development is a key aspect of culture—and at the same time, a challenge to cultural norms. How should Christians reconcile such tension? What is culture’s impact upon the biblical mandate to create wealth for holistic transformation? Earlier this year two evangelical groups, theLausanne MovementandBAM Global, released apaper exploringwealth creation within global cultural perspectives to address these and other questions about culture and wealth creation. In particular, the paper examines the ‘anthropological temptation’: the temptation to idolize culture, and to...

Note: This is post #58 in a weekly video series on basic microeconomics. Here’s a surprising fact: Firms have an incentive to increase job safety, because then they can lower wages. In this video by Marginal Revolution University, economist Alex Tabarrok explores this claim in much greater depth and answers the questions: Why do riskier jobs often pay more? Why has job safety increased over the years? How does a firm’s profit motive play a role? (If you find the...

On this episode of Radio Free Acton, Bruce Edward Walker talks with Ray Nothstine, Opinion Editor of the the North State Journal and Editor at the Civitas Institute, on the alternative country music genre. Then, Caroline Roberts interviews Jordan Ballor, Senior Research Fellow and Director of Publishing at the Acton Institute, on the link between Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Abraham Kuyper, and Thanksgiving. Check out these additional resources on this week’s podcast topics: John Mellencamp official site Carlene Carter official site Lillie...

Note: Some PowerBlog readers might be wondering why the Acton Institute is holding a Rome, Italy, conference on November 29:Globalization, Justice, and the Economy on 16th and 17th Century Spanish scholasticism (The conference will be broadcast on LiveStream. More information here.) Below is an overview of the importance of this school of thought and the historical implications for the nascent era of globalization. With a royal charter established in 1218, a vibrant cathedral school became the Universidad de Salamanca, the...

What just happened? Yesterday the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released a draft of the ‘Restoring Internet Freedom Order,’ a plan to roll back some of the ‘net neutrality’ regulations implemented by the Obama administration. What is net neutrality? Net neutrality (short for “network neutrality”) refers to both a design principle and laws that attempt to regulate and enforce that principle. Thenet neutrality principleis the idea that a public information network should aspire to treat all content, sites, and platforms equally....

Despite being surrounded by unprecedented levels of opportunity and prosperity, we live in a profoundly anxious age, fearful of economic disruption even as we resist the pull to idolize status, wealth, fortability. When observing the vices that persist amid economic freedom and abundance, many are quick to proclaim, “The market is not enough!” And they’re right. We also need gratitude. “We should bow in gratitude to God for His many favors,” said President Calvin Coolidge in his 1925 Thanksgiving Proclamation,...

Saturday marked “Holodomor Remembrance Day,” honoring the millions of Ukrainians who died of forced starvation at the hands of the Soviets in the 1930s. Some 80 years later, and a quarter-century after the Soviet Union’s dissolution, the Russian government still denies that this atrocity constitutes a “genocide.” Two days earlier – Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. – Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova told the international press that the Ukrainian government’s use of the phrase “the genocide of Ukrainians” is...

Today is the unofficial first day of the holiday shopping season. Here are five facts you should know about BlackFriday. 1. The term “BlackFriday” was coined by the Philadelphia Police Department’s traffic squad in the 1950s. According to Philadelphianewspaper reporter Joseph P. Barrett, “It was the day that Santa Claus took his chair in the department stores and every kid in the city wanted to see him. It was the first day of the Christmas shopping season.” Barrettt first used...