This post started in my head last night when I read Vanessa’s snark. The Dow Jones has hit 13k — and she’s conflicted, because she will leave the US soon and wants to cash out while it is high and the dollar is worth something — and yet she sees this as a disaster.
We are in the economic shit. There are many causes, but one is legalism and regulations, that mean that companies have to be big, and have to be political, for to survive you need both in-house lawyers and cronies. As Niel Ferguson was reported to say at ZH
However, here is the real problem. The world is no longer under a rule of law – but rather a rule of lawyers. The U.S. has the highest cost of law of any other country in the world. The rule of law is supposed to be speedy, efficient and effective. However, the rule of law has been corrupted by the legal system for self-serving needs.
There are three key indicators of the health of the “rule of law.”
Legal System and Property Rights
Regulation
Summary of Economic FreedomUnfortunately, all of these measures have declined dramatically since the turn of this century. The outcome of this decline over the last 13 years is that it is more difficult than ever to do business in the U.S. Compliance and regulatory costs are on the rise which reduces profitability.
(Ferguson calls this era the great degeneration. But he is part of it, in an off the cuff remark he caused offense by implying Keynes had no children and that was why he did not care in the long run he was dead… and that meant he was offending both gays and those who had suffered miscarriage. He has apologized. I’m not sure of this: in my mind the shade of Keynes is rising from the grave, and pointing out that gentlemen do not tell, and regardless, it is the ideas that matter, not what happened in his private life. Keynes may have been a progressive, he may have been damaging (and I think his policies are both) but he was an English Gentlemen of the old school).
Our modern hypocrisy nauseates. For it damns those who continue to have a conscience.
1Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will renounce the faith by paying attention to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, 2through the hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared with a hot iron. 3They forbid marriage and demand abstinence from foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. 4For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving; 5for it is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer.
OK. There are errors in this world. The problem is that those who consider that they can teach, whose conscience is ablated, want us to all join in their psychopathy. They discount trust and despise charity. And they have no time for the Law, and it is the Law I want to turn. Because as the suicide rate in my demographic increases, and families suffer, we need to look back and see what advice Moses gave those of Israel. For the consideration of scripture is always profitable for our spirits.
1After this there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
2Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. 3In these lay many invalids-blind, lame, and paralyzed. 4, 5One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” 7The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.” 8Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” 9At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.
Now that day was a sabbath.
1 Every seventh year you shall grant a remission of debts. 2 And this is the manner of the remission: every creditor shall remit the claim that is held against a neighbor, not exacting it of a neighbor who is a member of the community, because the Lord’s remission has been proclaimed. 3 Of a foreigner you may exact it, but you must remit your claim on whatever any member of your community owes you. 4 There will, however, be no one in need among you, because the LORD is sure to bless you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you as a possession to occupy, 5 if only you will obey the LORD your God by diligently observing this entire commandment that I command you today. 6 When the LORD your God has blessed you, as he promised you, you will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow; you will rule over many nations, but they will not rule over you.
7 If there is among you anyone in need, a member of your community in any of your towns within the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor. 8 You should rather open your hand, willingly lending enough to meet the need, whatever it may be. 9 Be careful that you do not entertain a mean thought, thinking, “The seventh year, the year of remission, is near,” and therefore view your needy neighbor with hostility and give nothing; your neighbor might cry to the LORD against you, and you would incur guilt. 10Give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so, for on this account the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. 11 Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.”
There are two points I want to take from this.
1. Do not be legalistic. Do not let the Lawyers tell you what you can and cannot do. As much as possible, work quietly and with trust. If you have to use contracts, stick to standard ones. Do good first, and seek forgiveness later. Human Resources is a false idol. If you do good, there will be complaints. So learn to pray about what you do, and that includes protection from the powers of this world.
2. Lend freely to the faithful. Now, we should lend freely to whoever can bring us a return, true. But we are expected to have some common sense here. The faithful, however, should have their debts forgive.
To make this stronger… if you believe the promises of God around prosperity, then there are conditions. Forgiving debts is one of them. If you preach prosperity, you better have mortgage freedom parties, and ensure that the poor in the faith are lifted up. (You better also avoid getting into debt to the non believers, because they have no interest in the idea of a sabbath year, or a jubilee. They want you all as debt slaves).
In the church we need to be able to run on an economy of trust. We need to be able to borrow on a handshake, and pay back — so that at the end of the seven years there is nothing to forgive. (The sabbath rule was given as an insurance: to allow for injury, for ill health, for the vicissitudes of life).
The current regulated, planned and functionally fascistic financial system is broken. It has promised too much largesse, placing too great a regulatory and taxation burden on the workers so that the regulators can have greater salaries.
The church does not to mirror this. We can work in other ways. And we are commanded to do so.
