Christianomics: A blog on economics, politics, and law

Economics studies how and why people allocate and use their limited resources. Everyone regardless of age, wealth, or ethnicity has 2 basic resources: money and time. Opportunity cost is the cost of choosing one decision over another. Money: I got a call the other day from Alliance Defending Freedom asking for financial support for their many ongoing legal battles (1). As someone interested in politics and the constitution these battles are very important to me. But then Glenn Beck called, asking for donations for the Nazarene Fund to evacuate as many Christians as possible from the trouble brewing in Afghanistan (2). Meanwhile Samaritan’s Purse was also pleading for supplies and personnel for Haiti following their 7.2 earthquake (3). I only have a limited amount of money and I cannot support every request though they are all important to me. By choosing to support one organization I am simultaneously choosing to not support another. Time: “Look carefully then how you walk, not as ...

  "It’s increasingly impossible to deny that both in the US and globally, prices are on the rise. Why does this matter? Well, inflation acts as a stealth tax on everyday people. Other consumers are getting hit with “shrinkflation” as stores shrink the size of packages for a given price, a sneaky approach for retailers wary of the backlash that comes with raising sticker prices. Inflation doesn’t come out of nowhere. It’s what happens when the government prints money to pay for spending, rather than directly raising taxes. Either way, we all lose." Source: https://fee.org/articles/we-just-got-proof-global-inflation-is-surging/?utm_source=zapier

(4) I hate inflation. To be more specific, I hate when government fails at basic budgeting and steals from its people by creating (printing) new dollars out of thin air. And last year the presses were busy. Nearly a quarter of all US dollars ever to exist were printed in 2020.(1) Looking at this in terms of supply and demand, when the supply increases, the demand (and resulting value) will decrease. This is why the pastry in the picture costs so much more in April 2020 than it did in March 2019. Nothing changed with respect to the pastry itself. It has the same ingredients and the same nutritional value. The only thing that changed is the value of the paper used to purchase it. Simply put, the government is stealing from people’s savings accounts. But rather than taking a measurable quantity of money, it is imperceptibly taking away the money’s quality. And this is what makes inflation so insidious. By the time the effects of inflation are being felt, the damage has already been done....

The minimum wage is in the news again thanks to the Biden administration’s stimulus bill (1). While I’ve already written about the history of the minimum wage and its effects on the poor, I wanted to address the root source of the minimum wage fallacy: Karl Marx’ Labor Theory of Value. To put it simply, the theory says that someone should be compensated based on how hard they work. If you have an easy job and aren’t required to work very hard then you should be paid little. If you have a more difficult job and have to work hard at it, then you should be paid more (2). While this sounds good on its face, this assumption is very dangerous and can lead a country down the path of minimum wage laws, price controls, and government controls of production (socialism). --------------------------------- Meet Dr. Hank, an average (Level 5 out of 10), everyday brain surgeon. He has a good work ethic (8 out of 10) and a positive attitude (7 out of 10). As an average, everyday brain surgeon, Dr. Han...

  My governor is threatening tighter restrictions on mask wearing and event attendance limits. To back up these restrictions he is promising to charge violators with fines and misdemeanors. This has of course spooked the locals and that’s why I just spent $200 On-groceries-I-don’t-need-but-might-need-in-the-next-four-months. That’s $200 I can’t invest in a 401K. That’s $200 I can’t use for Christmas shopping. That’s $200 I won’t have on hand for emergencies. Now granted, if none of these emergencies happen, my investment will balance out and the money I spent today will turn into money that I save in the future. But I only have that option because I was able to get ahead of the panic and I had an extra $200 in the bank. But what about the people who don’t get ahead of the panic or don’t have the cash on hand? This is the true devastation of the lockdowns. They disproportionately impact those who also are least able to prepare or react. So what’s the solution? Well on an individual ...