Recent installments in the Star Wars universe directly raise the theme of self-interest, and specifically the formation or deformation of the self. These instances help us ask the important question, “Who puts the ‘self’ in self-interest?” [Mild spoilers: If you are not current on The Mandalorian or haven’t seen The Rise of Skywalker, you may want to flag this post e back later.] In the season finale of The Mandalorian, we get a pretty full introduction to Moff Gideon, the...

When discussing globalization, advocates of the free economy usually start by stressing the large number of people who have risen out of extreme poverty in the last three decades. This period of poverty reduction showed a parallel growth in globalization. But it has not been even. Those who try to prove that we are living in the best of times usually use monetary statistics – they count the number and percentage of people who earn less than $1.90 per day....

Although it was intended to be an position, the “Hallelujah” Chorus from Handel’s Messiah has e the musical diadem of the Christmas season. It has already in early January vanished from the radio, because the modern West pre-celebrates all its holidays. (The Christmas season traditionally spans the “12 days of Christmas,” from December 25 until the feast of Epiphany on January 6.) However, it never would have graced the most joyous season of the year without the entrepreneurial spirit of...

As a new decade begins, it bears pausing to celebrate the strides the human race has made toward eradicating poverty at home and around the world. This is doubly important, as the television retrospectives not only omit our growing prosperity, but so many people believe things are actually getting worse. The global misconception that poverty is spreading is especially pronounced among those who support state intervention in the economy. The website Common Dreams proclaimed, “The Evidence Pours In: Poverty Getting...

The former UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson oncesaid that “the NHS is the closest thing the English people have to a religion” – but as a new story shows, it is a religion that forces people to break the Ten Commandments. Certain British citizens must lie to the government or face a punishing fine for telling the truth. One person to suffer this fate is a domestic abuse survivor and single parent who did not want to deceive...

Last November, my colleague Dan Hugger ments by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) about his desire for mon good capitalism” informed by Roman Catholic social teaching. Generally speaking, this is an aspiration that many at the Acton Institute share, but the specifics of what that would look like are where the real differences lie. At the least, this demonstrates how people of good will, of the same (or similar) religious and ethical tradition, can still have divergent opinions about policy. Shared...

Legal historian Wim Decock of the KU Leuven recently published a study of the economic thought of the Flemish Jesuit Leonardus Lessius (1554–1623). Last week the National Catholic Register posted an interview with Decock about his book and Lessius’s contribution to economics. Lessius was one of a host of significant early modern authors who addressed the economic realities of the burgeoning European market economies. These early modern authors, despite recovery efforts by Decock and other scholars, continue to be overlooked...

For many people of faith, especially Catholics and Orthodox Christians, churches are sacred places. An older cathedral, for example, is not a museum nor merely a relic of the past, but rather a place where it is believed that grace is given through sacraments, a place where God dwells. But, as Samuel Gregg argues in Spectator USA, Europe has lost respect for places of worship, a loss felt tangibly by the Church. “In 2017 alone, according to France’s Interior Ministry,...

Protectionist policies are, on the surface, attractive. Through state means, they promise to protect industries and workers as well as boost a country’s industrial production. But like most top-down solutions, there’s a catch; the government has a knowledge deficiency. “No one knows what technological innovation or entrepreneurial insight will upend the present economic landscape in America—or any other country,” explains Samuel Gregg in an article in Law & Liberty. “Nor can such developments be anticipated by economic nationalist policies.” Evidence...

This morning, as Americans go to work for the first Monday of the New Year, a growing number will see their wages rise to $15 an hour or more – thanks, not to higher minimum wage laws, but to the bustling free market. Increasingly, economists agree that in the frenetic labor market of 2020, the minimum wage has e virtually irrelevant. No one disputes that workers are earning higher salaries in 2020, and the lowest earners have received the biggest...