Grudem starts with the most fundamental principle of taxation – whether it should happen or not. He points out that Jesus endorsed the principle of taxation in Matthew 22:17-21, and that Paul also upheld this principle in Romans 13:6-7. However, later in his treatment of taxation, he implies that taxation is incompatible with his conception of human freedom and implies, again that government spending is less useful for society than private sector spending.

Setting the right tax rates

Grudem begins by looking at the general question of whether tax rates should be high or low. He says that if taxes are too low governments won’t have enough money to function (though he doesn’t mention the possibility of governments being dependant on foreign aid or state-run businesses instead of taxes), and that a tax rate of 100% will mean complete government control of the economy – something he’s already strongly disagreed with. In this, he is correct, and points to something that is commonly called the “Laffer Curve”.

A Laffer Curve similar to Grudem's

Grudem spends some time trying to establish why a lower rate of tax might produce more tax revenue. He says that:

1. lower tax rates encourage businesses to invest and grow
2. that this produces more jobs and lower prices – which benefit the economy, and encourage greater economic growth
3. that the growth leads to higher incomes for businesses and individuals
4. that because there is greater economic growth, there will be greater tax revenues despite lower rates of taxation.

I think this theory does have some significant flaws. Firstly, there’s the inherent assumption that government spending does not contribute to the economy as much as the same money spent privately. Yes, this is true in some cases (the UK government buying new nuclear weapons moves a lot of money out of our economy and into the US economy), but not in others (spending on basic infrastructure that wouldn’t be commercially viable, but is essential for businesses to function effectively).

Secondly, it assumes that tax levels are a major factor in economic growth, when there are dozens of other factors that are likely to make a larger difference. Proving this theory to be true or false would be virtually impossible, due to the statistical noise. Especially if you only made fairly small changes – and taking a penny off the basic rate of income tax is far more likely than taking 10p off.

Thirdly, some of the consequences Grudem lists don’t necessarily follow. Economic growth doesn’t necessarily mean that companies will produce more jobs – my employer was consistently downsizing its UK workforce before the current economic problems started, and is continuing to do so now. And it has remained a highly profitable company for the entire period. And whilst the corporate executives may have seen higher incomes as a result, many of us doing the actual work have seen our real-terms incomes stagnate or even decline. Whether things like more jobs and higher wages follow from economic growth or not depends on a range of economic factors, and tax rates will only make a difference at the margins.

Grudem does list some examples of tax cuts which he says increased the tax take. He starts with Ronald Reagan’s tax cut in 1981, saying that economic growth and real incomes increased during this period. He ignores the fact that the US (and global) economy during the Carter years was dominated by the 1970s oil crisis – something that had cleared up by Reagan’s era. Whilst the tax cuts may or may not have contributed to the Reagan-era boom, there were clearly far bigger factors in play.

He also cites George W Bush’s tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. Now I had a brief look at the US revenue service website, and from what I can make out, tax revenues fell in the wake of the 2003 cuts, and Bush left office with a massive budget deficit (even if you ignore the effect of the bailout/stimulus right at the end of his second term), although he had inherited a budget surplus from Bill Clinton. Basically, it’s highly questionable whether these tax cuts actually boosted either the economy or tax revenue. And by portraying the case as clearly proved, Grudem is doing his readers a disservice.

Should everybody pay tax?

On Wednesday, I’m going to look at the balance of taxation between rich and poor (and companies and people). But Grudem raises a good point about taxation in general by saying that everybody who earns income should pay some taxes. His point is that if you pay taxes, then you have a greater stake in the way government spends it. He agrees that the poorest should pay lower taxes, citing Leviticus 12:8 as an example of such a provision, but strongly disagrees with the idea of anybody paying no tax at all.

Whilst I think it’s actually quite a good principle, Grudem’s arguments are very much ideological. Elsewhere in the sections on tax, he deplores the politics of envy, which he believes is solely responsible for the idea that rich people should pay higher taxes. Here he seems to be espousing the right-wing equivalent – a sense of envy that the government is spending his taxes in ways that he doesn’t approve of, and seems to think that this is a feeling that everybody should share.

Also, there is a big question about how such a policy is feasible. In many countries, working a full-time job on the minimum wage simply doesn’t pay the bills. Unless and until wages for those at the bottom of the system are at least high enough to cover basic living expenses for a family, you can’t expect to levy more than a token amount of income tax on the poorest. And in both the USA and many parts of the UK feeding, clothing, and housing a family on the minimum wage is impossible without help from either the state or charities. Unless minimum wage levels are raised, or there are radical changes that would result in the living wage being lower (something like citizens’ income, for example), then taxing the poorest will simply increase the poverty level.

Bookmark to:

Should we tax the rich?

Grudem begins by arguing that it isn’t fair for governments to take more money from the rich simply because they are rich. In support of this, he quotes Exodus 23:3 and Exodus 23:6, which warn against showing bias towards or against the poor in a lawsuit. He then goes on to assume that progressive taxation (where the rich pay a higher proportion of their income than the poor) is there to punish the rich, and argues that punishing people for any reason other than them having done evil is wrong (quoting Proverbs 17:26). He then says that the government has no inherent right to take their wealth unless it can be shown that they got it through criminal activity (he doesn’t mention the possibility of it being from highly immoral actions that are within the law – something that is more common in big corporations than many of us think). He then portrays such taxation as stealing – in his view, the wealth is rightfully theirs, and the government has no right to tax them.

Hopefully, it should be clear from this summary that Grudem’s view on taxing the rich depends on assumptions about what taxation is, rather than being something drawn from Biblical principles. If taxation is theft, then he is right. If, however, the government has the right to levy taxes, then he offers no reason why it should not tax those who can afford it more heavily than those who cannot. We’ll go into the issue of taxation in a lot more detail next week, but for now we’ll just note that Grudem’s arguments about how government should interact with the rich show a clear hostility to the principle of taxation.

Should we strive for economic equality?

Grudem agrees that it is appropriate for government to run welfare programs to provide a safety net so that people don’t go without food, clothing, or shelter. That such programs should give people the opportunity to gain enough skills and education to earn a living. And that such programs can be funded from general taxation, as this is clearly something that fits with the government’s purpose to promote the general well-being of society. He does, however, disagree with the idea that reducing inequality is something the government should do.

He believes that policies to reduce inequality harm both the economy and society. In his view, they penalise hard work, productivity, and frugality whilst rewarding profligate spending, wastefulness, and frittering away time on unproductive activities. He insists that taking extensive action to reduce inequality would lead productive people to give up and that any society which tries it would spiral downwards into poverty and despair. He also claims that attempts to make people equal in their economic possessions, will necessarily mean that they become unequal in terms of political power, citing the Soviet Union as an example.

I could probably spend a whole series of posts dealing with this line of argument, but I’ll try to be brief.

Firstly, Grudem is clearly unaware of the very large body of research that links economic equality with better outcomes in terms of healthcare and a range of social problems (much of this research was summarised in the book The Spirit Level by Wilkinson and Pickett – which is pretty much essential reading if you want to contribute to the political debate around this issue). If this research is correct, then promoting economic equality is most definitely promoting the well-being of society.

Secondly, the Soviet Union is far from the only example of government heavily promoting economic equality. If Grudem’s arguments were correct, then the Scandinavian countries would be hopeless, despotic, poor countries rather than strongly democratic nations which routinely top league tables on quality of life issues.

Thirdly, there’s something of a paradox to Grudem’s views. The vices he lists are exactly the kind of things that today’s Western free-market economy not only encourages, but utterly depends on. If Grudem were consistent with his view of what constitutes a virtue and a vice, he would be advocating policies that put a curb on consumerism, rather than arguing forcefully for the economic system which created it, and depends on it.

Fourthly, economic inequality produces political inequality. Bill Gates has far more political power than any voter earning the average wage. Which pretty much destroys any argument about economic equality causing political inequality. At worst, you could argue for an Animal Farm situation, where normal people are relatively powerless either way.

Should Government help the poor?

When it comes to poverty, Grudem agrees that the Bible is crystal clear on the need to help the poor. However, he rejects the idea that government has the right to compel rich people to help the poor or to tax the rich to give to the poor – claiming that there are no Bible passages which justifies that idea. He rejects the idea that government handouts are the solution, as they have to be repeated forever. Instead, he believes that the solution is to encourage businesses to grow and thrive, and hence produce jobs. He again claims that a free-market solution is the way to do this, combined with punishing crime, enforcing contracts, enforcing patent and copyright laws (he doesn’t address the question of whether such laws are compatible with a free market), and protects private property. He also claims that relatively low taxation (we’ll address this next week), an effective education system, and a trustworthy banking system are needed.

There are, again, a number of problems with Grudem’s analysis. Firstly, growing businesses do not necessarily create more jobs. For example, the shift from local shops to supermarkets in an area increases the profits made by the retail sector at the same time as reducing the total number of retail jobs. Secondly, some of the things he says are necessary are somewhat at odds with each other. Patent laws, for example, are an artificial restriction on the free market

However, on the key principle of whether it is wrong for government to intervene directly on behalf of the poor, Grudem has clearly missed a large chunk of what the Bible has to say. If we look at the laws God gave to the nation of Israel in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy then we see a number of laws specifically designed to force the rich to help the poor, and to reduce the extent of inequality. Here are a few of them:

The Year of Jubilee

Leviticus 25:8-34 establishes a practice called the Year of Jubilee. Every 50th year, land was to be returned to the family who originally owned it. In an agricultural society, land is the ability to produce wealth. It’s worth nothing that, when this was written, individualism was thousands of years in the future – families mattered more than their members. Furthermore, the original distribution of land was pretty much equal – so every family should have had pretty much the same amount of land. In short, the law ensured that everybody had equal access to the means of production.

The 21st Century equivalent of this would be something along the lines of requiring that, every 50 years, stocks and shares would be taken off their owners and redistributed equally amongst the population. You could keep what you had gained from the investment, but not the investment itself. The principle here is more radical than any pro-equality measure that’s being seriously talked about today, and it seems somewhat surprising that Grudem missed it. No, it isn’t the communist ideal, but it’s far closer than anything capitalist societies have to offer.

The Sabbath Year

Whilst the Jubilee only came around every 50 years, there was a more frequent law to restore some measure of economic equality. According to Deuteronomy 15:1-18, every seven years all loans were to be cancelled and all slaves to be set free. To understand this, though, we need some historical context. In the Old Testament era, loans were not something you took out as an investment – they were something you did so you could get bread tomorrow. The equivalent of today’s payday loans. And slavery was something you sold yourself into because you needed to eat. Unless you were prepared to beg or steal, these were the only options open to the destitute in the cultures of the bronze age Middle East. And it’s worth noting that other laws ensured some level of protection and basic dignity for people forced into either option.

However, the important thing for our topic is that the Sabbath Year put people back on a more equal footing. Unlike with modern bankruptcy, there were no lasting consequences for the cancellation of debts. Nor were there any conditions. You didn’t have to deserve your freedom from debt or slavery, you simply got given it, and had a chance to start again. No, it’s not a law designed to bring everybody to the same level. But it does place limits on how far the effects of inequality could be felt.

Tithing

In Deuteronomy 14:28-29, every third year people were expected to give a tithe (10%) of the food that they grew (essentially their income) so that the alien, the widow, and the orphan (the socially disadvantaged who made up the bulk of the poor in that era) would be able to eat. When Grudem claims that there is no justification in the Bible for government taking money from the rich to give to the poor, I can’t help wonder who he thinks was supposed to enforce this law.

The modern equivalent of this is the welfare state – paying taxes to ensure that people can’t fall below the absolute poverty line. In a modern industrial (or post-industrial) society, the state is the only institution capable of doing this on a large enough scale. The equivalent arrangements should include adequate benefits for those out of work because our societies simply don’t create enough jobs for everybody. They should also ensure as a high priority that there are adequate benefits for those who cannot work due to illness or disability.

Gleaning

Finally, Leviticus 19:9-10 establishes that farmers were to deliberately leave some of their crops so that the poor could harvest them. The law specifically required those who owned the means of production to give a portion of that to the poor. Yes, the poor had to do some work to get the produce, rather than just being given it. But this is almost certainly the first (and possibly the only) example of a law which forced people to give to charity. The nearest equivalent today would be government programs which use tax money to fund charitable programs.

In Conclusion

Yes, Grudem is right to say that the Bible doesn’t teach that we should aim for the (impossible) ideal where everybody is economically equal (though nobody outside of the far left is advocating this). And that it doesn’t say that having some very rich people is a bad thing. But the Bible does very clearly show that society as a whole has a responsibility to prevent absolute poverty. And it provides examples of laws which require the rich to use at least some of their wealth for that end. And, of course, there is a fairly substantial (and increasing) body of empirical evidence that shows that the kind of extreme inequality we see in today’s world is not helpful in dealing with a wide range of health and social problems.

If government genuinely intends to serve the common good, then one of the things it does should be taking action to reduce poverty and decrease levels of inequality. In my opinion, the question should not be whether government does these things, but instead what is the best way of doing so.

Bookmark to:

Grudem begins by marking out some fairly widely agreed common ground – there needs to be some level of government regulation of the economy, if only to ensure that we have a consistent system of weights and measures. He also agrees that it is good for government to provide some goods and services – he mentions roads, traffic regulation, the military, the police, the fire department, and possibly a postal service.

He then says that there are three main approaches to the rest of economics, the “free market” approach, the “socialist” approach (which he defines as the government owning most of the means of production), and the “communist” system (where the government owns all property). This is, at best, an oversimplification, and arguably a misuse of terms. Communists don’t aim for state ownership of property – Marxist theory views such an arrangement as a purely transitional one. A better term for what Grudem calls communism would be “state socialism”, and what he calls socialist is really just a lesser form of this. Also, his terms of reference leave no room for Social Democracy (government steps in to mitigate the human cost of free market policies – most notably in the form of a welfare state), which is the dominant approach taken in rich-world countries.

Does the Bible teach free market economics?

Grudem argues that the Bible supports a broadly free-market approach. Based on his (highly flawed) view of private property and human liberty Grudem argues that the concept of government owning property is not Biblical, and that government control of the economy is an infringement on human liberty. What Grudem doesn’t offer here are any arguments based directly on scripture. He is building on conclusions he reached in other sections of the book (and ones which I have already argued are somewhat flawed). In particular, he bases his arguments on claims that state-owned property is not taught in the Bible (which he extends to cover businesses as well as property), and on an overstatement of the principle of human liberty.

Do free markets work?

Grudem argues that free markets have, historically, brought better results than systems where the government intervenes in economy. Let’s look at the claims he makes:

Are they better at producing goods and services?

This argument is that free market goods are of better quality and lower price than produced in alternative economic systems, and that they are goods that people actually want. As evidence, Grudem offers fairly subjective impressions he had from visits to Eastern bloc countries during the Cold War.

This argument has a couple of somewhat fatal flaws. Firstly, it assumes that any differences are due to differences in the economic system, rather than the political one – the Eastern bloc countries were repressive dictatorships, something that isn’t a necessary part of a state-run economy. Secondly, similar comparisons could be made in reverse – citizens of (communist) Cuba have a better standard of living, and are probably happier than those in nearby (capitalist) Haiti. Thirdly, and most importantly, it’s anecdotal evidence – and hence it’s somewhat risky to base important policy decisions on it.

So what does the evidence suggest? As far as I can tell, it’s fairly neutral. The state-controlled Chinese economy produces far cheaper goods than any of the rich-world Western nations, as does the South Korean economy, where the government intervenes heavily in the economy. Quality is somewhat more subjective, but there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that private businesses, if left to their own devices, will trade in quality (or ethics) for greater profit whenever they feel they can get away with it. There are, of course, exceptions to that rule, but it’s certainly true of the vast majority of large companies. There are a wide variety of factors that affect the price and quality of goods, but state control (or the lack of it) is unlikely to be at the top of any objective list.

Do they allow freedom to choose your job?

Grudem argues that free markets allow everybody to choose what job they work at, encourages better training for your job, and allows you to know you will be rewarded for better quality work. He contrasts this with the government picking you a job, which is at best a simplistic portrayal of how jobs are allocated in a state socialist system – by my understanding, people can still have an influence on their job in such systems.

My problem with this approach is that it is somewhat naive. Some people don’t get any choice of job in a free market system. Long-term unemployed people rarely choose to live that way – although they do sometimes give up on ever getting out of their situation. Other people have their careers railroaded by their company, or find themselves stuck in a dead-end job. There are plenty of careers where there are fewer jobs than there are people who want to do them. Other careers need lots of workers, but are things almost nobody would choose to do if they had a choice. And being rewarded for doing your job well in a free market system depends on you happening to have a good employer. In some companies good work does go unrewarded, and the way to advance your career is by being good at office politics, rather than by being good at your job. Finally, even if you want career-related training it may not be available.

In short, whilst the system might work that way for some, it doesn’t for everybody.

Do they allow companies to hire the best?

This argument directly conflicts with the previous argument in favour of free market systems. Freedom to choose your job is in direct conflict with freedom to choose who to employ. Because wanting to do a particular job is not the same thing as being good at it (or, more importantly, as being seen to be good at it), a system that does one well will necessarily do the other one poorly. Finally, there is research that shows that random promotions are more effective than promotions on perceived merit – which goes to show that employers are often very poor judges of who will be a good employee.

Do they produce goods that people actually want?

Grudem is almost right on this one. In a free market, a firm that produces things that nobody wants to buy goes out of business. The goods still get produced, but not for long. But it’s worth noting that this isn’t a zero-sum game. Many good companies thrive not on making things we want, but on convincing us to want the things that they make.

The most obvious example of this is Apple. Before they brought out the iPod, the iPhone, or the iPad, nobody particularly wanted those things. If these had been standard product launches from a generic company, maybe they would have sold and maybe not. But you wouldn’t have seen them become instant “must have” items. And once there are competing products on the market, Apple’s products tend to be the most expensive, but nowhere near the most capable, products on the market. And yet they usually still outsell their competitors by a massive margin. And this phenomenon can be found to some degree with almost every major brandname product. People buy it not because it serves their needs better than the competition (if at all), but because advertising has persuaded them that they need it.

Does a free market system accurately predict our economic wants?

This one is straying very firmly out of the realms of observable effects and into the realms of ideology. Grudem claims that, unlike government agencies, the free market is able to predict the economic wants of millions of people at any point in the future and then plan effectively to meet those wants. He claims that the system routinely provides each neighbourhood with just enough of a product to meet consumer demand for a day.

This is, of course, not true. Shops do run out of stock, shops do order too much – even a casual look at the amount of food UK Supermarkets throw away each day would prove that the free markets often get things wrong. There are cases where there are genuine demands that aren’t met (e.g. TV shows which fans would pay good money for but are not available to purchase), price fluctuations that are caused by gambling on commodity markets, and bear no relationship to the actual supply of or demand for a product, and overproduction of products which nobody actually wants. It’s perfectly possible that there is usually a better match between supply and demand in a free market system than in the alternatives, but the assertion has never been proven.

What happens when government runs a business?

Grudem claims that free market competition improves productivity, quality of products, and keeps prices low and that, therefore, it encourages economically beneficial activity. He disparages Christians who view economic competition as “unspiritual” or “unchristian”, but doesn’t attempt to engage with the reasoning behind such views. He contrasts this with government, claiming that because government is in a unique position it necessarily has a monopoly, and that it is, therefore, a poor creator of wealth.

This leads me to wonder whether Grudem has heard of “natural monopolies” – goods or services which naturally lend themselves to being run as a monopoly. Public transport, for example, is an industry where direct competition is pretty much nonsensical – two bus companies running the same route would be ludicrous. Other obvious examples include policing, the fire service, the postal service (what private company would offer same-day delivery to remote rural areas for the same price as urban ones?), basic utilities (the infrastructure for gas, electricity, and water is necessarily a local monopoly), and healthcare (which we’ll be devoting a whole post to in a couple of weeks time). He also ignores the fact that state-sponsored companies often have competition. For example, the existence of the NHS has not prevented BUPA from offering private healthcare and the Royal Mail exists alongside courier companies who compete for services.

In conclusion

My arguments in this post should not be taken to mean that free markets are a system with no benefits. In some industries, free-market systems seem to work perfectly well. However, insisting that they are the best possible system for all industries is to veer into a form of economic fundamentalism. In his arguments, Grudem often appears to assume that government-run companies would necessarily get it wrong, even if they had the same people making the same decisions.

Finally, there is no indication in any of Grudem’s arguments that there are times when the pursuit of economic goals conflicts with social ones. The slave trade was a very profitable industry which helped grow British, American, and African economies. However, it was hugely destructive to both American and African society and was morally abhorrent. A truly free-market society would never have contemplated abolishing it, and yet we now agree that doing so was the only morally justifiable option.

In his defence of free-market economics, Grudem either forgets or marginalises such issues. If the state directly takes control of some areas of the economy it at least has the potential to put social issues front and centre. Which is something that private businesses, who are legally obliged to put shareholder profits first, are often unable to do.

Bookmark to:

Economic Growth

Grudem believes that government should promote economic growth because is is something that promotes the general welfare of the nation, one of the aims of government. He rejects the idea that this approach constitutes materialism, because economic growth is something that is morally good. He cites Genesis 1:28, where God tells humanity to “subdue” the earth and “have dominion over” the life on it. He says that the hebrew word that translates as subdue means “to subdue, dominate, bring into servitude or bondage”, and that it implies that God wants us to “investigate, understand, use, and enjoy the resources of the earth”. He cites passages such as Deuteronomy 8:7-10, which promise material blessing (in terms of excess food) for those who follow God. Grudem also believes that passages like Galatians 2:10 and 1 John 3:17 – which remind us to help the poor imply that poverty is bad, and cites this as a reason for supporting economic growth.

Now, there is a caveat here – as Grudem notes, we cannot serve God and money (Matthew 6:24), but cautions that we shouldn’t think that material goods are evil in themselves. He says that the Bible never encourages people to seek to be poor, or to make others poor, but instead to seek to help and care for those who are poor. Grudem also says that there are also practical benefits to economic growth – a rich nation is better able to fulfil many of God’s other commands – mentioning raising children, caring for those in need, and building the church.

Now, Grudem is right that money and the things it can buy is not inherently evil, and that working to produce things is morally good. There are, however, some problems with his view. Firstly, this emphasis veers dangerously close to prosperity theology (God wants you to be rich and healthy) – which is almost certainly the most dangerous false teaching floating around Christianity (and particularly Western Christianity) today. Secondly, there is good reason to doubt that economic growth – in and of itself – will relieve poverty (an issue we’ll be covering that in the next two posts). Thirdly, there are cases in the Bible where God tells people to become poor. Jesus said precisely that to the rich young ruler in Luke 18:18-30 , following it up with a comment about camels going through the eye of a needle. No, it’s not a universal command – it was for a particular person – but it does show that poverty is not necessarily something for Christians to avoid. Fourthly, in a rich nation some of these other commands can be more difficult. Christianity in the Western world is, for the most part, dull and lethargic compared to Christianity in places like Latin America, Africa, China, or South Korea – nations which are nowhere near as rich as the West. In many senses, building the church is more difficult in a rich nation – overcoming the love of money that pervades a rich society is a big challenge.

Inflation

Grudem begins talking about inflation by using practical arguments that, whilst “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evils” (1 Timothy 6:10) money itself is a good thing. He says that money is a superior system to bartering, and that it is necessary because very few people are able to provide for themselves everything that they need in order to live. He says that the best way of providing a currency is for the government to do it – as this ensures that it is known, accepted, and has a standard value across a nation. He also says that, in order for the system to work, the value of a currency must remain stable over time. He cites examples of hyperinflation (when prices rise at a ridiculous rate – e.g. doubling every day) to show some of the problems increasing prices may cause – pointing out that, when this happens, the currency collapses as nobody uses it. He says that even at lower levels of inflation, it means that people are being robbed of their money. He then says that the cause of excessive inflation (note: this is the only time he suggests that inflation is sometimes acceptable) is always the printing of too much money, before spending a whole page lambasting the US government for bailing out the banking system in early 2009 because it would lead to increased inflation,

This view of inflation is, of course, somewhat simplistic. Other factors like supply and demand (especially for commodities like oil – the price of which affects almost every part of the economy) play a large part. And the actual effect of inflation can be very different across different social groups. In the UK, the current inflation rate on food, heating, and rent is higher than the official inflation rate, whilst the price of consumer goods has been dropping. This means that the poor suffer from a much higher inflation rate than the rich.

Also, in covering these two issues, Grudem neglects to mention that it is difficult for government to promote both low inflation and high economic growth. If the economy grows, then there is actually more money in the economy, and it becomes worth less – causing inflation. On the other hand, stepping in to prevent rising prices will inevitably deprive some sections of the economy from making more money.

Furthermore, Grudem’s criticisms of Obama’s attempts to deal with the recession, and save the banking sector from collapse, through increasing the theoretical money supply ignores the wider context. Yes, it may increase inflation (which, incidentally, will reduce the real-terms national debt – or at least the portion of it owed in the national currency) but saving the banks prevented the US economy from collapsing – remember, the vast majority of money exists in the form of numbers in a bank’s computer system, rather than in the form of coins and notes).

Finally, Grudem’s analysis ignores the fact that the vast majority of money created in the modern world is created by private banks, rather than by governments. The simplest way of explaining this is by looking at what happens when you put £1000 into a bank account. The banks are legally required to keep a small proportion of money in actual currency. For the purposes of this example, we’ll pretend that they have to keep 10% (the real figure varies from country to country, but is usually lower). Of your £1000, the bank has to keep £100, and can lend the rest out. When your neighbour borrows that £900, he puts it in a bank account (or spends it – and the shop puts it in their account). Either way, the new bank has £900, and has to keep £90. They lend the other £810 out, and the cycle continues until the banks have created several times more money than originally existed.

A note on government spending

In passing, Grudem describes US Government spending as “out of control”, despite the fact that the US has lower taxes and lower spending (relative to both the population and the size of the economy) than the vast majority of comparable countries. He cites one economist who appears to be blaming it on the Democrats, despite the fact that the current US debt and deficit was built up during the Bush administration.

Bookmark to:

And here’s something the Bible says about the whole event:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. e was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.

The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”) And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. (John 1:1-17)

Merry Christmas

Bookmark to:

Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel

All of which makes the secular version of Christmas feel, well, utterly wrong. For many people today, Christmas is a celebration of crass commercialism. This was brought home to me last week when I saw the story of Mekeeda Austin, a 13-year-old who has written a death threat to Santa if she doesn’t get the presents she wants. Her list of demands includes a Blackberry Smartphone and “the real-life Justin Bieber”, and she justifies her letter by saying “I want all of these things and I don’t see why I shouldn’t get them.”

Leaving aside the obvious responses I could make to that comment, this is entirely the opposite of a Christian attitude. The real St Nicholas would likely have had a violent reaction to the idea that we should celebrate Christ’s birth by insisting that we have a right to consumer goods. And Jesus’ attitude to the first Christmas couldn’t be a greater contrast with that of Miss Austin. The carol I quoted above goes on to put it like this:

Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth

On that first Christmas, Jesus went from ruling in heaven to lying an animal feeding trough in a borrowed room, becoming utterly dependant on flawed human beings. And He did it for our sake. The Bible puts it like this:

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:5-8)

This Christmas, let’s follow Christ’s example and put others before ourselves, rather than get lost in the dead-end of living our lives for the worthless tat that our consumerist society tells us we want and need. Let’s scrap Mammon-mas and instead genuinely celebrate Christ-mas.

Bookmark to:

Stop talking ¤¤¤¤. Stop taking the piss with privilege. Stop taking politics as merely a game about being elected over your rivals. Stop believing PR is the most important part of being a politician. Stop destabilizing debate with mindless cross party bitching. Stop ignoring facts and experts when drawing up policy. Stop reactionary policy. Start taking the younger generation seriously. Grow some balls and stand up for progress not the status quo

Now, the chances are that most, or all, of these opinions are widespread amongst the 35% of people who didn’t vote in the last general election. So let’s talk about ways that politicians can address some of them.

Learning to act like responsible adults

The expenses scandal isn’t the first time politicians could have been accused of “taking the piss with privilege”. There have always been some politicians who milked the system for personal advantage, and I doubt it’s possible to stop it completely. But what we can do is put safeguards in place. Building in accountability to expenses systems, cutting down on privileges that have traditionally come with some political offices, making sure that politicians are not privileged above the people whose lives we affect, for example. Taking a current issue – if Parliament is demanding that civil servants pay more into their pensions, get less out, and get it later why are they not doing the exact same thing to MPs pensions?

Finally, as politicians, we need to take personal responsibility when it comes to public office. Elected politicians should, if possible, make sure they have some kind of accountability structure in place when it comes to salaries and expenses. Don’t wait until it becomes a news story or election issue to have somebody check up on these things. And get it in place even if you’re just a local councillor with limited opportunities to go wrong.

When it comes to mindless cross party bitching, I agree with that sentiment. Whenever I watch Prime Minister’s Questions, the impression I always come away with is that it is utterly childish. Now, I understand that those of us involved in the day to day of politics will have gripes about the other parties, but we need to keep them in perspective. Yes, some parties may play dirty. Others may have sold out their principles. Others may be hopelessly naïve, or utterly clueless. But let’s remember that, for the most part, they are trying to make the world a better place. Keep the bitching to internal meetings, and only when it’s appropriate (e.g. working out clean ways to counter dirty tactics on the campaign trail).

Unless a particular politician has clearly proven themselves corrupt or incompetent, let’s focus on the reasons our principles and policies are better than theirs, rather than attacking the people. This is particularly important for bloggers, and those who post on twitter. Because the nature of the medium, it’s too easy to get caught up in day-to-day politicking, and make instant judgements, which clear-thinking hindsight should regret. By all means, lambast parties like the BNP, who have no redeeming features – but do so by highlighting their fascist policies, and the way that their councillors and MEPs have proven themselves unfit to hold public office.

In terms of not demonising the other side, one thing that I find particularly helpful is having good friends of very different political persuasions, with whom I occasionally talk politics. For example, a couple of months ago I spent a good hour talking politics with a good friend who is a natural Tory voter. Value getting to understand where the other side is coming from. Be prepared to listen to them. Work out if there are ways to incorporate their concerns into your policies,

Focus on the substance

Whilst public relations are clearly an important part of politics, let’s not be bound too tightly by them. Yesterday, I had a conversation with a friend about this very issue, and he said that the Prime Ministerial debates in 2010 got him more interested in politics because the leaders of the big three parties had to talk policy. – something that is missed in the vast majority of day-to-day media coverage of politics. Let’s aim to appeal to people like that by being more about substance than spin. Yes, it’s harder to sell in these days of soundbite-dominated news. Yes, it doesn’t always fit with the media narrative. Yes, it may sometimes lose you seats or even elections. But if enough politicians focus on the substance, then the media would have no choice but to cover it.

If you want to see a textbook example of us getting it wrong, look at the referendum on AV. Instead of being a debate about the relative merits of the voting system, both sides ignored the substance. The Yes campaign went for guff about it “making MPs work harder”, rather than pointing to the advantages – like tactical voting being made effectively irrelevant. The No campaign went for scare stories about it being too complicated for our tiny little brains, and how it would keep Nick Clegg in power for ever. They also made up a massive figure for how much it would cost, rather than defending First Past the Post. Let’s not stoop to those levels of inanity or dishonesty in our politics.

Finally, it’s bad for politics if politicians to always be chasing after the same bit of centre ground. If there are only small and minor differences between the parties, then it’s far easier for the media to focus on the Westminster gossip angle of politics, or to reduce it to a popularity contest between party leaders. Yes, our current electoral system doesn’t help, but lets not blame First Past the Post for the way the big parties have gradually reduced their ideological differences over the last few decades. Let’s ensure that voters are given as real a choice as possible at election time.

Oh, and let’s make sure that politicians are free to voice dissent. If a party has a substantial body of policy, then it’s inevitable that party members (including those holding elected office) will disagree with some of it. As long as they make it clear that’s what they’re doing, let’s not complain about it, or let the media get away with attacking their party. The Green Party’s policy of not having a party whip is a step in the right direction, let’s find more ways to make political debate within parties open and transparent.

Make good policy

Too often policy is made purely on the grounds of how it plays in the media, rather than on the grounds of the actual evidence. I recently came across a guardian article about a book that showed instances of the media playing exactly such a role. Lets not let our drugs or immigration policy be dictated by headlines in the Daily Mail. But, on the other hand, let’s not crack down on the bankers just because the Mirror or the Guardian say so. Now, I’m fairly confident that my party’s policy-making process takes into account the views of experts, and our policy is usually easy to change when there are new facts that come to light (or old mistakes that are highlighted). But there are undoubtedly some areas where we fall short. Let’s keep an eye out for bad policies, and make sure that we do genuinely consult the experts before making policy.

Engaging the young

Now, it’s quite easy to see why policy is often biased towards older people – there are more of them, and they’re more likely to vote. But if we want to draw people in to the political process, then we absolutely have to show young people why it is important, and how it directly affects their lives. The wrong way to do this is to try to be cool. Don’t, for example, rave about the latest band unless you genuinely like them, and it is relevant to whatever you’re talking about. Young people can spot insincerity miles away and you’ll just look stupid. Instead, we need to address their issues, and then stick to what we said.

I’ll take two examples of this. Back in 1997, I was a student and – like most of the country at the time – was very happy to see the back of the Tories. However, within a couple of months, New Labour went from their election slogan of “Education, Education, Education” to abolishing student grants and simultaneously introducing tuition fees. I felt betrayed, particularly as the expert report that came out shortly after the election recommended only doing one or the other and not both. Whilst Labour hadn’t directly talked about an issue that would affect the students in the year below me, they clearly showed that they weren’t interested in my demographic.

Fast-forward to 2010, and the Liberal Democrats had learned part of that lesson. They did talk about tuition fees, and every Lib Dem who was elected signed a personal pledge to vote against a rise in tuition fees. They subsequently voted for the rise, and students – who were rightly angry – took to the streets in their thousands.

If we are to get young people interested in politics again, then we need to avoid mistakes like these. We need to be talking about their issues, and sticking to our guns. I don’t want to be responsible for somebody’s first experience of politics to be a feeling of betrayal. I want their first experience to be of politicians working hard on their behalf to make the world a better place. I want their first experience to be of people who work to make society better for the worst off – whose hearts are in the right place, and who have the skills to make a real difference (or at least to push as hard as possible for that difference).

In short, those of us involved in politics should make every effort to be the kind of politicians who are deserving of the trust people place in us at the ballot box. We should live up to the best hopes of the general public, even though those hopes have so often been crushed in the past. No, we’re not going to be perfect, we’re not going to get everything right. But let’s at least give it our best shot.

Bookmark to:

Before examining what Grudem says, I want to lay out the various different notions of property that exist (there may be more, but these are the ones I can think of):

1. Everything belongs to God. For a Christian, this should be the foundation of our views on property. Human beings do not own anything in our own right, everything is essentially on loan from God (see, for example, Leviticus 25:23)
2. Things can belong to individual people, this is “private property”. The keyboard I am using to type this belongs to me and not to anybody else. This category also covers some cases of mutual ownership: my parents’ house belongs to both of them.
3. Things can belong to an organisation. My employer (a big corporation) owns the desk I sit at when I am at work.
4. Things can belong to a family or a tribe. This is less common in countries like the UK, where there are extensive and formal property laws, but in many “traditional” societies, a farm belongs to the family rather than to any one member (or generation) of the family.
5. Things can be “common property”, belonging to the community, the town, the nation, or the human race. Common land has been a feature of the vast majority of societies throughout history, though it has often been abolished during the process of industrialisation. The creative commons and free/open source software movements have created new areas of common property when it comes to artistic and intellectual endeavours. One church in my area runs community houses – whose residents share most of their possessions with each other.
6. Things can belong to the government or state. For example, most of the roads in the UK are owned and (sometimes) maintained by the state.

What forms of property does the Bible endorse?

Grudem begins by pointing out that the Bible endorses the principle of private property, pointing out that it is implied by the commands “You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15) and “You shall not covet” (Exodus 20:17). He claims that communism (by which he means the state socialism of the USSR, rather than the communist ideal) is the most dehumanising economic system ever invented, because it means that the state controls everything, and hence becomes one big prison. He does, however, acknowledge that property belongs ultimately to God.

He also cites 1 Samuel 8:10-18 – which warns about the downsides Israel would face in having a king, pointing out that the king would take various things from the people. He cites 1 Kings 21:1-29 as another example of this. However neither passage says that it is wrong for government to own property beyond the minimum which it needs in order to function, which is the implication Grudem is apparently trying to draw.

Grudem then says that private property is one aspect of human beings being made in the image of God – he believes that God’s sovereignty over the universe is something that is reflected in our ability to be sovereign over our own possessions.

Grudem doesn’t really address other types of property (types 3-5 in my list above). None of the ones I’ve listed are incompatible with private property, and none of them are explicitly ruled out in the Bible. And there are passages in the Bible that seem to support some of them. For example, the people of Israel were not allowed to permanently sell their land outside of their family – Leviticus 25:23-28 (see also Joshua 13:8-21:43) establishes that the land in Israel was to be treated as belonging to the family or tribe (type 4), rather than to whoever “owned” it in the current generation. The church in Jerusalem in Acts 2:44 and Acts 4:32 had some form of common property (type 5) – although Acts 5:1-11 establishes that this co-existed with private ownership of land. The one kind of property I can’t find any real Biblical evidence for is ownership by an organisation (type 3). Although equally, that kind of ownership isn’t forbidden.

What are the advantages of private property?

Grudem claims that private ownership is essential for economic development. He says that people being able to own property and a business means that they can build a business, and hence grow the economy. He believes that the lack of formalised property rights in most poor countries are a key factor in them staying poor. Which would be solid reasoning if it weren’t for the fact that a far higher proportion of people in almost all poor countries run their own business than in any rich country. Yes, many of these businesses are not legal entities, but they are still businesses.

His claim also runs into the problem that the term “economic development” is one that has an incredibly wide range of meanings. Grudem appears to reduce the term to economic growth (which effectively means “there is more money going round the economy”), rather than using the more rounded concepts which take into account the human condition (the standard measure of development these days is the Human Development Index – which also takes into account access to education and healthcare).

Grudem also worries that the American state is threatening private property ownership. He criticises the US Government’s actions in 2009 to prevent the collapse of some of the nations big corporations (Citigroup, Bank of America, Chrysler, General Motors) on the grounds that it gave government effective control of these businesses (he doesn’t mention that these businesses would almost certainly have gone under without that intervention).

He also criticises the 2010 healthcare reforms for putting control of the healthcare system in the hands of the federal government (a claim which is – at best – an exaggeration. The US remains the only rich world country where the national government does not provide some form of universal health insurance). He criticises environmental regulations for preventing people from having control over their own property, and laws that allow the government to designate some land as federal property as an assault on the principle of private property.

Finally, he claims that government ownership of companies and property results in a loss of human freedom. He doesn’t consider that in some cases it might result in increased freedom – for example, public use of land may allow more people to make good use of that land than if it remained in private hands. He worries that state involvement in healthcare will make healthcare professionals servants of the government – as if that is somehow worse for them than being servants of insurance companies, as they are under the current US system.

Grudem also doesn’t recognise that there are practical advantages to other forms of property ownership. In 2009, Elinor Ostrom won the Nobel prize in Economics for her work looking at how communal systems of ownership can actually be very effectively managed. Environmental campaigners have long recognised that communal ownership often means that natural resources are managed for their long-term value across generations. By contrast, under capitalism, there are countless cases of fisheries being depleted, vast areas of land being left deforested, or whole areas being left damaged by industrial pollutants.

In Conclusion

Grudem has a much more narrow view of property than is found in the Bible. He restricts the concept to ownership by private individuals (and, though he never says so, private organisations), and regards ownership by government as an assault on freedom. He doesn’t consider other models of property ownership to be morally valid or good for society, even though several of them are found within the Bible.

Also, it’s noteworthy that Grudem does not mention the concept of intellectual property. Given that there are an increasing number of voices questioning the legitimacy of patents in particular, and broader notions of intellectual property (copyright and, to a lesser extent, trademarks), this is a notable omission. Granted, the US Pirate Party probably hasn’t made headlines like its European cousins, but failure to even make a brief nod towards this debate is a significant omission.

As Grudem’s model of economic policy depends on his overly narrow concept of property rights, we will give him the benefit of the doubt over the next couple of weeks as we work our way through the rest of the chapter. Although we will try to point out places where a different concept of property ownership would directly undermine his arguments.

Bookmark to:

The principle of discipline

Grudem starts by looking at the Biblical principle of discipline. There are many Biblical passages that tell parents to discipline their children (e.g. Ephesians 6:4, Hebrews 12:9-11), and I doubt there are many parents who would disagree with that principle. Grudem, however, asserts that the Bible teaches that discipline should include corporal punishment. He cites Proverbs 13:24, 22:15, 23:13-14, 29:15 as examples. All of these proverbs refer to corporal punishment (“the rod”) as a way of ensuring that children get the discipline they need.

Grudem’s weakness here is that he does not deal with the argument that these passages do not require Christian parents to use corporate punishment. The argument, as usually put, is that all of these verses come from Proverbs. And the usual interpretation of this book is that we take the principle that is being applied, but not necessarily the specific application. For example, Proverbs 25:24 says

It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife.

Most of us would interpret that as “try to resolve arguments and live in peace with your husband/wife”, rather than “if you get into too many arguments with your husband/wife go and live on the roof”. Applying this to the verses Grudem quotes, it is not necessary to take “the rod” as requiring that Christians include corporal punishment as part of their discipline. Although, equally, it makes it pretty much impossible for Christians to argue that corporal punishment is necessarily bad for children.

What effect does corporal punishment have?

Grudem points out that laws banning corporal punishment do not necessarily prevent genuine child abuse, saying that assaults by adults against children between the ages of 1 and 6 quadrupled between 1984 and 1994 in Sweden despite a law banning smacking.

He also says that studies claiming that smacking is harmful to children are based on very poor methodology. In particular, he cites a 1993 study that showed that, of 132 studies that supposedly documented negative effects of smacking, only 24 had any empirical data. And 23 of those had ambiguous wording and broad definitions that encompassed both clear-cut child abuse (such as pouring boiling water over a child) and the responsible discipline that those on the pro-smacking side argue for (a light smack with a hand or blunt instrument).

Grudem also cites a claim by Gene Edward Veith (Culture editor of World Magazine) that not smacking a child could be considered child abuse. Veith’s argument is, essentially, that because children are learning that adults will not use force against them in any circumstances, they can then ignore those in authority, and hence learn how to misbehave, rather than to behave.

Finally, he takes the assumptions underlying the view that smacking is bad to task, pointing out that many on that side of the argument start with the assumption that children (and human beings in general) start out as basically good, rather than human beings having the tendency towards evil that the Bible establishes. He also believes that some on that side oppose the idea of parental authority – either a dislike of authority in general, or a belief that right and wrong are entirely down to the individual.

So is he right?

I’m not convinced that Grudem is right to say that smacking is a necessary part of disciplining children, but (unless there’s evidence both he and I are unaware of) he’s certainly right that the evidence for it being harmful is inconclusive at best, and that the view you take on this issue tends to reflect aspects of your worldview, rather than anything else. He is certainly right that the people who want to ban smacking in order to prevent real child abuse are aiming at the wrong target. Those prosecuted under such laws would most likely be either a handful of parents who continue to use smacking as the punishment of last resort, or those who at some point lose patience with their kids (which is an experience common to the vast majority of parents) and smack them in a momentary loss of self-control. Genuine child abusers would continue to cover their tracks in the same way they do under existing laws in both the UK and the US.

Bookmark to:

Who should be responsible for education?

Grudem begins his argument by claiming that the Bible places the responsibility for educating the next generation on parents, and not on society as a whole. He cites Deuteronomy 6:4-7, which seems to me to be an instruction to the nation of Israel as a whole, and not just to those who happened to be parents. He cites various verses in Proverbs that talk about parents training their children, and some New Testament passages (Ephesians 6:1-4; Colossians 3:20-21) teaching children to obey their parents. He concludes that, because the government is not mentioned in any of these passages, that the responsibility for education falls solely on the shoulders of parents. Assuming that his conclusion is correct, he cites some cases where courts (in Germany and New Hampshire) have intervened in to compel homeschooled children to attend state schools – and considers this a worrying inversion of the principle he believes in.

Grudem does, however, allow some role for state schools, seeing them as a way of assisting parents in their task of training their children. His case here would probably be stronger if he referred back to the history of schooling in Western countries, and the factors that led state schooling to be created in the first place (basically, that charities and private schools were utterly incapable of providing the universal education that was felt to be necessary in an industrial society – something that would be even more acute in our modern information age). It would also help address one problem that arises from his position: if those of us without children bear no responsibility for their upbringing and education, why should our taxes be used to pay for or subsidise education?

Grudem’s Solution: School Vouchers

Grudem believes that the best solution for education would be a system of school vouchers: every parent would have vouchers that would pay for the cost of their childrens’ education in either the public or the private sector. He believes that this will provide several benefits:

1. that parents would have greater influence
2. that it would establish “healthy competition”, as the best schools would get more pupils and the worst would go under. He claims that state schooling holds the US education system back compared to other nations (even though all comparable nations I’m aware of have plenty of state schools)
3. that it allows parents to send their kids to schools that support their parents’ moral values
4. he claims that this would mean that children are better educated, citing the introduction of vouchers in Milwaukee – where, in the year that a voucher scheme was introduced, schools with a very high proportion of voucher-eligible children improved at a greater rate than other schools. He doesn’t say whether the study controlled for other variables that might have affected the results.

He also rejects claims that such a scheme could violate the separation of church and state if vouchers are used to send kids to religious schools.

Grudem is also in favour of other ways of increasing parental choice – such as giving tax credits for tution payments. He doesn’t, however, consider other ways of increasing parental influence, such as ensuring that schools and the government bodies that oversee them (School districts in the US, Education Authorities in the UK) are made as democratically accountable as possible.

How much say should teachers have?

Grudem claims that the reason that American teachers’ union the NEA opposes school vouchers is that

“it knows that privately run schools will do a much better job of educating children if only they can compete on an equal basis for the tax dollars that support the public schools.” (emphasis his)

So, basically, he’s saying that “teachers oppose me because they know I’m right, and that my policy will give kids a better education”. Which – unless teachers in the US have an entirely different approach to the job to those I know in the UK – goes way beyond presenting a strawman argument and into the territory of potentially libellous statements. Now, perhaps Grudem believes that the views of the NEA do not reflect those of its members – in which case, he really ought to make the distinction clear. But the vast majority of teachers I have come across want to give children a better education, and the exceptions tend to be those who have been worn down by the job. If they and their union oppose school vouchers, it isn’t because they think they’ll give kids a better education, it’s because they think that they won’t.

He does make some interesting points in his later section on the NEA – about how there are parts of the US where there is effectively a closed shop (teachers have to pay their union dues, even if they don’t join). I agree that such an arrangement is clearly wrong. However, what most strikes me about this is that it seems very odd for this to be legal in a solidly right-wing country like the US.

Grudem ultimately blames the NEA for the poor standard of education in the US (and, incidentally, he never provides any evidence for the claim that the US does worse than other comparable countries). However, these arguments seem somewhat disingenuous – he claims that the problem is that NEA-staffed state schools have a monopoly on state-funded education. He claims that this monopoly is the reason that kids from inner-city schools have poor academic achievement (surely the fact that they live in poverty is a more important factor – and one that applies across the Western world). He also claims that the reason private schools do better is because they are free of government direction and union regulation, rather than that, for example, because they spend more money per pupil (as is the case with private schools in the UK).

So is Grudem right?

For me, Grudem’s arguments fall at the first hurdle of the principle. Because he interprets the Bible in an individualistic way, he ignores the possibility that education is a responsibility for society as a whole, and that – as a consequence – government has a responsibility to ensure that every child has the chance at a good education (the purpose of government including restraining evil and promoting the good of society). Instead, he fails to justify the principle of government having any involvement in education, making his policy proposals seem to be at odds with his principles on the issue. In particular, he doesn’t explain why those of us who aren’t parents should be contributing at all to the education system.

Furthermore, his specific proposals do seem to have some holes in them. Firstly, they aren’t the only way to make schools accountable to parents – in fact, a democratic model would mean that decision-makers are directly responsible to the parents (and the rest of the local community), rather than being responsible to businessmen, who are only responsible to parents to the extent that a parent can move their child to another school (as is the case in a private school).

Also, there are some fundamental problems with the whole idea of introducing markets into the education system. Basically, it’s very difficult to get good, reliable information about schools’ performance in education. Yes, parents can make good judgements on a school’s value system, but how can they tell if the school gets good results by teaching to the exams, or by offering a rounded education? And if exam results are published, then schools can easily manipulate the league tables. Here in the UK, there are criticisms that school league tables mean that less able children simply aren’t put in for exams (hence making the school’s results look better) and that the schools deliberately choose the easiest syllabus/exam from the various examining bodies.

Also, there’s no guarantee that a school’s past performance will continue for the whole of a child’s time there. A new headteacher (or principal in the US), a change of teaching staff, a change in intake, or (for private schools) a change of ownership could all change the quality of education, and by the time it becomes apparent, several years’ worth of intake will have been affected. Such problems are inherent in a system that is dominated by the concept of parental choice.

All of which is to say that Grudem’s preferred policy of school vouchers may well work in practice in some contexts. But it’s a very long way from being the only education policy that is consistent with the Bible, and it’s very far from proven that it would deliver the best educational outcomes. Which makes it somewhat disappointing that Grudem portrays it as both.

Bookmark to: