It was once mon practice of saloons in America to provide a “free lunch” to patrons who had purchased at least one drink. Many foods on offer were high in salt (ham, cheese, salted crackers, etc.), so those who ate them naturally ended up buying a lot of beer. In his 1966 sci-fi novel, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, Robert Heinlein used this practice in a saloon on the moon to highlight an economic principle: “It was when you...

Self-described democratic socialist, Sen. Bernie Sanders is doing relatively well in the race for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination. He recently polled at 34 percent (an increase from 30 percent in November) and, anecdotally, I passed several “Bernie” bumper-stickered cars on fairly empty roads this morning. Despite Sander’s and democratic socialism’s fashionableness these days, a Frenchman born in 1805 already warned against and explained the dangers of this kind of socialism. Writing for The Federalist, Acton’s Director of Research Samuel...

“There can never be a world without work,” says James Bruce in this week’s Acton Commentary. “We are made to work. We flourish when we do, and we suffer when we don’t.” Now, if we think about work’s purpose or goal, we will realize that work can never end. Philosophically, rational agents have specific conditions for genuine flourishing, one of which is work. The sociological data certainly support the claims that we are made for work, and that we suffer...

As we close out the year, we want to thank our PowerBlog readers for reading and contributing to our blog. If you’re a new reader we encourage you to catch up by checking out our top 10 most popular posts for 2015: 1. A Guide to Laudato Si: A Section-By-Section Summary of Pope Francis’ Encyclical on the Environment Joe Carter Pope Francis has released his eagerly anticipated encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si’. While the document deserves a close reading,...

While it may be difficult to imagine, there was once an era when the New York Times was concerned about the poor. Consider, for example,a 1987editorial they ran with the headline, “The Right Minimum Wage: $0.00.” As the editors noted at the time, [Raising the minimum wage] would increase unemployment: Raise the legal minimum price of labor above the productivity of the least skilled workers and fewer will be hired. If a higher minimum means fewer jobs, why does it...

If you ask most people why they support raising the minimum wage they’ll says it’s because it helps the poor. But as David Neumark, a scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco notes, numerous studies have shown that there is no statistically significant relationship between raising the minimum wage and reducing poverty. That finding may appear to be counterintuitive. After all, if poor people have low wages then increasing their wages should help reduce their poverty. To some...

A new Pew Research Center analysis of survey data shows that younger generations tend to have more-positive views than their elders on a number of institutions that play a significant role in American society. Here are 7 figures you should know from the report: 1. Millennials’ rating of churches and other religious organizations dropped 18 percentage points from 2010 to 2015. In 2010, nearly three-quarters (73 percent) said churches have a positive impact on the country; today, only 55 percent...

For most of my life, much of what I’ve learned about the world came from watching movies. This was especially true in 1983, when I was in junior high. That was the year I learned about astronauts (The Right Stuff), thermonuclear war (War Games), and ewoks (Return of the Jedi). I also learned about financial crimes—specifically insider trading— from the Eddie Murphy/Dan edy, Trading Places. If you’ve forgotten the plot, here’s a brief summary by Gary Gensler, the former Chairperson...

The day after Christmas, presidential candidate Bernie Sanders asked on Twitter: “You have families out there paying 6, 8, 10 percent on student debt but you can refinance your homes at 3 percent. What sense is that?” My snarky tweet in response was, “Because you can foreclose on a house but you can’t repossess an MFA in creative writing.” A more thorough (and thoughtful) explanation is provided by Megan McArdle. She explains why loans secured (such a by a house)...

Bernie Sanders appears to think all we need to be happy is more money,” says Samuel Gregg, Acton’s director of research, but Alexis de Tocqueville dismantled that idea two centuries ago. Tocqueville’s first reproach was that socialism—whatever its expression—has an inherently materialistic understanding of humans. “The first characteristic of all socialist ideologies is,” Tocqueville insisted, “an incessant, vigorous and extreme appeal to the material passions of man.” Tocqueville may have wrestled with religious questions for much of his life. Nevertheless,...