Good intentions and unintended consequences

Kevin DeYoung has posted a good, informative, e-mail interview with Jay Richards, author of Money, Greed, and God: Why Capitalism Is the Solution and Not the Problem. The whole interview is worth reading and so, no doubt, is the book. What the author calls "myths" are each pretty common beliefs and deserve debunking. Two of the questions DeYoung asked and Richards' answers:

In your book, you unpack eight mistakes Christians make with economics. I don't want to make you rewrite the whole book for this interview, but could you give a one sentence description of each myth?

Here's how I summarize the eight myths in my book:

• The nirvana myth (contrasting capitalism with an unrealizable ideal rather than with its live alternatives)
• The piety myth (focusing on our good intentions rather than the unintended consequences of our actions)
• The zero-sum game myth (believing that trade requires a winner and a loser)
• The materialist myth (believing that wealth isn’t created, it’s simply transferred)
• The greed myth (believing that the essence of capitalism is greed)
• The usury myth (believing that charging interest on money is always exploitative)
• The artsy myth (confusing aesthetic judgments with economic arguments)
• The freeze frame myth (believing that things always stay the same—for example, assuming that population trends will continue indefinitely or treating a current “natural resource” as if it will always be needed)

I linked the myths to eight corresponding questions:

• Can’t we build a just society?
• What does God require of us as Christians?
• Doesn’t capitalism foster unfair competition?
• If I become rich, won’t someone else become poor?
• Isn’t capitalism based on greed?
• Has Christianity ever really embraced capitalism?
• Doesn’t capitalism lead to an ugly consumerist culture?
• Do we take more than our fair share? That is, isn’t our modern lifestyle causing us to use up all the natural resources?

I struggled with this taxonomy for a while, but I do think the vast majority of bad thinking on economics among Christians can be placed in one of these eight categories. ....

You go out of your way to argue that the universe is divinely ordered and purposeful. What difference does this make for our approach to economics?

I think that a culture's general beliefs about the nature of reality can have significant economic consequences. For instance, if one believes that the world is orderly and designed for a purpose, one is more likely to look for, and discover, aspects of that order. Moreover, these beliefs can encourage optimism, delayed gratification and a motivation to make the world a better place. Finally, it prevents one from reducing economics to materialism. The most important truths of economics emerge from the reality of the human person. That reality requires a theological/philosophical framework that can accommodate it.

Of course, to offset utopian tendencies, these beliefs are best tempered with a healthy realization of our flaws. In the Christian worldview, original sin fulfills this function. [more]

DeYoung, Restless, and Reformed: Money, Greed, and God: An Interview with Jay Richards