Joe Carter

Joe Carter is a Senior Editor at the Acton Institute. Joe also serves as an editor at the The Gospel Coalition, a communications specialist for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, and as an adjunct professor of journalism at Patrick Henry College. He is the editor of the NIV Lifehacks Bible and co-author of How to Argue like Jesus: Learning Persuasion from History's Greatest Communicator (Crossway).

Posts by Joe Carter

March 08, 2016

Alabama Church Pays Off Payday Loans

About twenty years ago I made some terrible choices and found myself in a serious financial bind. The amount I needed wasn’t much — about $200 — but without it I wouldn’t have been able to pay my rent. Continue Reading...
March 07, 2016

Donald Trump and Milton Friedman Debate Free Trade

If it wasn’t for Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump would win the title of most economically illiterate presidential candidate in the short history of the twenty-first century. A prime example of why he’d earn this ignoble title is Trump’s opposition to free trade — a position which, not surprisingly, he shares with Sanders. Continue Reading...
March 04, 2016

The hockey stick of human prosperity

Since the era of Adam Smith economists have been asking, “What creates wealth?” One key answer is specialization and trade. On a timeline of human history, the recent rise in standards of living resembles a hockey stick — flatlining for all of human history and then skyrocketing in just the last few centuries. Continue Reading...
March 02, 2016

Pope Francis, Donald Trump and the Problem of Populism

“What would happen when these populisms collide at the first Francis-Trump summit?” asks Kishore Jayabalan in this week’s Acton Commentary. “We may shudder at the thought, but if Catholicism and strident nationalism are indeed so opposed, we may be left waiting for another St. Continue Reading...
March 02, 2016

Should Christians Help Kill the $100 Bill?

What if there was an easy-to-implement government policy that would hardly affect ordinary people but would make it substantially more difficult for criminals — from drug dealers to terrorists to human traffickers — to carry out their illicit trade? Continue Reading...