Public Policy

June 02, 2015

EcoLinks 06.02.15

Cardinal Turkson: together for stewardship of creation Cardinal Peter K.A. Turkson, Vatican Radio Despite the generation of great wealth, we find starkly rising disparities – vast numbers of people excluded and discarded, their dignity trampled upon. Continue Reading...

June 01, 2015

EcoLinks 06.01.15

In the spirit of PowerLinks, we’ll be adding a regular roundup on news concerning Pope Francis’ forthcoming encyclical on the environment and, more broadly, religious witness on environmental stewardship outside the Roman Catholic Church. Continue Reading...

May 28, 2015

Unions Lobbied for a $15 Minimum Wage—Now They Want an Exemption for Unions

In every major city that is increasing the minimum wage (Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles), labor unions have been at the forefront of the change. For example, in an op-ed for the Huffington Post titled “Raise Los Angeles’ Minimum Wage and Enforce It,” Rusty Hicks, a labor leader in L.A. Continue Reading...

May 28, 2015

Sirico: Care for The Poor is in Christianity’s DNA

President Obama remarked that he would like faith organizations and churches to speak to poverty solutions “in a more forceful fashion” at a Georgetown University summit in mid-May. The meeting included faith leaders from Catholic and evangelical denominations, and included political thinkers Robert Putnam of Harvard, and the American Enterprise Institute’s Arthur Brooks. Continue Reading...

May 27, 2015

Ancient Israel had 613 Regulations; Modern America has Millions

In the Old Testament there are 613 commandments. Of those 248 are “positive commandments,” to perform an act, and 365 are “negative commandments,” to abstain from certain acts. Some of those include commandments that are deemed to be self-evident (“laws”), such as not to murder and not to steal. Continue Reading...

May 21, 2015

The Federal Government Spent $100 Billion on 18 Food Programs Last Year

The federal government spent more than $100 billion providing food assistance to Americans last year, according to recent testimony by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Eighteen federal programs provided food to 46 million people—approximately 1 out of every 7 Americans. Continue Reading...

May 21, 2015

Why It’s Every Citizen’s Job to Interpret the Constitution

A few days ago I mentioned Michael Stokes Paulsen’s crash course on how to interpret the Constitution. Paulsen outlined five techniques of constitutional interpretation that courts and commentators employ: (1) arguments from the straightforward, natural, original linguistic meaning of the text; (2) arguments from the structure, logic, and relationships created by the document as a whole; (3) arguments from history, original intention, or purposes behind an enacted text; (4) arguments from precedent; and (5) arguments from policy. Continue Reading...

May 20, 2015

How Free Trade Helps the Poor

Several years ago economist Bryan Caplan provided the most succinct and helpful statement about how we should think about free trade: “We’d be better off if other countries gave us stuff for free. Continue Reading...

May 18, 2015

Are Churches Failing The Poor?

For those in poverty, or those simply facing tough times, churches are often places they turn to for help. It may be organized aid: soup kitchens and food pantries. It may be a gas card given to a single mom who is struggling to get from one pay day to another. Continue Reading...

May 15, 2015

Religious Shareholders at the Climate-Change Dance

It’s prom season, the time of year when plenty of high school kids eagerly anticipate an invitation to the year’s biggest formal event. It’s no different for the member organizations of religious shareholder activist groups As You Sow and the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. Continue Reading...

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