If you’ve ever been in a discussion with people on Facebook, you know there are a lot of simple-minded people. Worse, there are ignorant and arrogant people who spew some of the worst rhetoric. Some of it comes from Christians. The following is a short course in “How to Teach Simple-Minded People about Economics.” American Vision did not create it. The following is what I (Gary DeMar) know about i [...]
Gary talks about his decision to sell his comic book collection, as well as the concept of collecting and value as a whole. The story of Paradise thus gives us important information about the origin and meaning of precious metals and stones, and therefore of money as well. Right from the beginning, God placed value upon gold and gems, having created them as reflections of His own glory and beauty. [...]
Gary discusses the next phase of the Democrats’ disastrous economic policy in an attempt to buy votes in future elections. There are two owners: the lender and the borrower. The lender owns money. This is a capital asset. It could be used for consumption purposes, but the owner is a capitalist. He prefers to put his money to use in order to gain even more money later on. He looks for borrowe [...]
Gary reveals little knows information from the 1970s proving that the IRS has a long history of using its power to push social agendas, including education. Many new private Christian schools were formed during the 1970s because negative changes in the public schools (completely unrelated to desegregation) had alerted parents of the need for specifically Christian education. These private schools [...]
The recent passing of Ronald Sider is an opportunity for Gary to tell the sad history of Christian socialism in America. In 1972, a collection of articles by F. A. Hayek was published in Great Britain: A Tiger by the Tail. It was on central bank inflation. The tiger today is much larger. It is much more dangerous. The world is still on the tiger’s back. Money is the most marketable commodity. [...]
Gary discusses electric cars, economics, and the current administration’s love affair with making political laws influenced by climate change. Almost every business in the United States started and prospered without the help of the government. This does not mean that once some businesses started and prospered that they did not try to use the power and authority of civil government to thwart [...]
If you are going to debate a topic, it’s important that you define terms. So much of what our government does is based on muddied definitions of terms. You almost never hear the words “abortion” and “homosexuality” by advocates of these practices. They choose terms to obscure what really takes during an abortion and what kind of sex homosexuals engage in. To mask what is really going on, they lead [...]
Today’s Marxism has little to do with Karl Marx. Marxism in its purest form is an attack on capitalism, not culture. Once workers united against their capitalist exploiters, so the argument goes, the inevitability of Communism would be realized, and everyone would be equal with no exploitation. During the panel discussion that I participated in at Liberty University during the Falkirk Faith Summit [...]
On today’s podcast, Gary discusses taxes, politics, the elite, and Bernie Sanders. Socialist Bernie wants to tax those evil rich people that can afford super-yachts. The way for politicians to sell a tax increase to a majority of voters is to persuade middle-class voters that only the rich will pay the new tax. Middle-class voters keep buying this obvious lie. They are told that there is too [...]
Were the miracles in the Bible tricks? Was Jesus an extraordinary stage magician? Did He pretend to raise people from the dead, walk on water, and feed thousands? Was Jesus like Jim Jones, using some of His followers to concoct an elaborate deception on the people to build a following of nationalist zealots to overthrow the Romans? Some people believe this, even though Jesus rejected any notion of [...]
Theologians virtually ignore the economic commentary in the Bible. In the few cases where it gets any attention, economic commentary in the Gospels and other New Testament writings tend to lapse into simplistic class warfare nostrums. Liberation theologians import Marxism wholesale (but they try to sell it retail) into theology. Academic historians of first Century Palestine/Judea have been pushin [...]
“You shall not steal” is a fundamental biblical commandment that’s found in both Testaments (Ex. 20:15; 21:16; Lev. 19:11, 13; Matt. 19:18; Rom. 13:9). If property is theft, as one Christian stated on his Facebook page, then every person in the world is a thief because everyone owns something. Property rights are fundamental in the Bible, so much so that they’ve been written into our nation’s laws [...]
Biden and Co. want to steal more money in the form of taxes in the name of “the people.” The people will be fooled into believing that taxing the rich is for the greater good, and they have a right to use the power of government to reap the benefits of the immoral confiscation. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) wore a dress with “Tax the Rich” emblazoned with large blood-red letters while she [...]
Jerry Newcombe’s article below explains the negative implications of government interference in the economy. Subsidies disrupt the economy at many levels and often cripple the people they are meant to help. Anyone familiar with government wealth transfer legislation that has been designed to help the poor knows that when something is subsidized you get more of it. There have been multiple generati [...]
As the Cuban crisis unfolds, we are seeing an unprecedented number of protesters. Some of these dissidents could lose their lives for their bravery. A friend of mine from church is from Cuba. Carlos was a political prisoner for 18 months in his home country. His crime? Trying to escape Cuba. Eventually, he did get to escape. I asked him about today’s protests. He said, “62 years later—this i [...]
Failure to follow God’s economic laws results in disaster for individuals, families, corporations, and nations. Those who make daily economic decisions in running a business and keeping track of household expenses understand this. If a family fails to pay its bills or writes bad checks to postpone bill collection, it suffers the consequences of having creditors call demanding payment. What is true [...]
The following article was written by John Livingston, a deacon at Midway Presbyterian Church where my wife and I attend. For the record, our church has been open since April of 2020. One of the requirements of “the Lord’s bond-servant” is that he must handle “accurately the Word of Truth” (2 Tim. 2:15) and be “able to teach” (2:24). To teach, a teacher must know God’s Word and know how to apply it [...]
Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren wants to impose a two-percent wealth tax on the richest Americans. The wealth of most rich people is in stocks and other investments they own. The 16th Amendment is very clear: “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived…” People who own stock do not pay tax on their stock gains until they sell their stock. It’s th [...]
When George W. Bush was running for President, I debated Jim Wallis, who is the founder of Sojourners, a leftist ministry masquerading as a Christian ministry. I don’t remember everything about our debate, but the one thing I do remember is that he could not answer this one question I asked: You mention that numerous places in the Bible address the poor. Can you supply one verse that states that c [...]
Biden and Co. want to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour. First, like so much of government regulation, this is theft. Only governments (and the mafia) can force people to pay more money for work they don’t do. Second, it’s a job killer for young people trying to get work experience. If you listen to Democrats, most Americans are working at jobs for minimum wage pay. It’s not even close to the [...]
