The 2020 election pitted a violent leftist movement against a crass, self-centered incumbent who uses the levers of power to benefit himself. The campaign hardly proved inspiring. It also ended up with results that confounded the professional political class and distressed tens of millions of Americans. Days after voters cast their ballots, the presidential race remained undecided, and a nasty legal and PR battle continues to play out. For Catholics and other Christians, the temptation to e agitated, concerned, and...

Victimhood is central to popular analyses of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the scramble for victimhood was central to our political discourse prior to 2020, government bailouts have exacerbated this narrative. Individuals must pete to create the pelling story in order to receive aid. Among those fighting for the spotlight are public school teachers, female university faculty, and the very sympathetic airline executives. Part of the problem is that natural safety networks such as family and the church...

The COVID-19 pandemic has further eroded America’s already flagging support for religious liberty, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito warned in a prophetic speech to the Federalist Society. Alito’s critics described his clarion call to respect our nation’s first freedom as “charged,” “unusually political,” and “unscrupulously biased, political, and even angry.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren called the justice a “political hack.” But a new survey shows that most Americans share Justice Alito’s assessment of faith in the public square, with surprisingly strong...

Economists and ethicists agree: A worker should be evaluated by the job he does, not his political views. But the more politicized life es, the greater the chance petent employee will lose his or her job because of his private political views. Politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez propose blacklisting their political foes, potentially including tens of millions of people, over politics. In an Orwellian twist of fate, the best employees may be fired precisely because they perform their job to the...

As if 2020 could not get any worse, this week intellectuals unleashed another pandemic: a new proposed tax. Deutsche Bank suggested that the government lay a 5% “privilege” tax on employees who work from home, on the grounds that they “disconnect themselves from face-to-face society.” This misguided scheme would engage in useless social engineering, disregard the needs and wishes of female employees, harm vulnerable workers, require a massive invasion of privacy, and subsidize failing business owners to cut low wages...

In the information age, Americans have tended to elevate certain jobs and careers over others, leading to a general resistance to “blue collar” work and an over-glorification of desk jobs, start-ups, and “creative spaces.” Reinforced by constant cultural calls to “follow our passions” and pursue four-year college degrees, workers have e narrowly focused on a shrinking set of job prospects in sectors like technology, finance, marketing, and activism. Such attitudes have led to an ever-widening skills gap in the trades...

Such simple concepts of economics as scarcity, the importance of contract enforcement and private property rights, and the retreat of global poverty seem altogether foreign to many influential people — including many who make economic policy. Nonetheless, these are bedrock principles shared by a broad variety of economists. And they are now more accessible to the 275 million people worldwide who speak French as a primary language. The Acton Institute’s Religion & Liberty Transatlantic website has posted a French translation...

Throughout the COVID-19 crisis, America’s planning class has relied on a predictable mix of so-called stimulus and monetarist tricks to curb the pain of economic disruption. Such heavy-handed interventionism has long been misguided, but for many, the government’s efforts have not gone far enough. Last spring, California Gov. Gavin Newsom talked of exploiting the pandemic as a way to “reshape how we do business and how we govern,” leading us into a “new progressive era.” Others, like Bernie Sanders and...

When President Donald Trump fell ill with COVID-19, there was absolutely no contemplation of moving America’s head of state to another country to receive healthcare services. This might be surprising, considering the oft-quoted World Health Organization ranking of our healthcare system at 37th globally. Wouldn’t we want our president to be treated in the country with the very best healthcare? The problem, of course, is that parisons in healthcare often mislead. This was true before the pandemic, but it has...

Everyone in the global fight for liberty has some item that cultivated his intellectual palate. For Chinese dissident Jimmy Lai, it was a candy bar. As an eight-year-old boy, he worked as a baggage carrier in a railway station in his native mainland China. After he carried the bag of a visitor from Hong Kong, the man gave the future billionaire a piece of chocolate. “It was amazing,” he says. Eating that delectable sweet made him believe “Hong Kong must...