Thanks for the links.
I have to admit, I only have a very vague understanding of dstributism.
I don’t have the time to check out the links right now, but I’ll be sure to look at them later.
Here is my very undereducated take on distributism and free markets right now. Feel free to correct or dispute any of this:
1) Free market economies have been wildly successful, unlike anything ever seen before or since.
2) Distributism requires an authority to distribute the means of production, likely a government authority. I see that as a negative.
3) I love how in capitalism it is the free choice of people to give charitably. Charity is much more powerful when it is freely given. I am not saying that this is not a trait of distributism, either.
Have you read the book the Church and the Market by Thomas E. Woods?
I haven’t myself, but I’d be interested in your opinion on it if you have.
Have a nice day.
“”1) Free market economies have been wildly successful, unlike anything ever seen before or since.””
You might be able to say that 50 years ago but It has progressed into excessive greed in driving power into the hands of the immoral elite that have crushed the small and local businesses of commodities,etc... and consolidated certain industries to the rich where prices can be controlled unfairly to eliminate any competition and enslave the consumer.
“”2) Distributism requires an authority to distribute the means of production, likely a government authority. I see that as a negative.””
Capitalism require authority too,dear fried
You have an immoral authority right now with Capitalism that controls prices with corruption through politics etc..
Distributism goal is private ownership and breaks things down to supporting local business and communities with the moral authority being Church teaching on economics and morality based on love of neighbor where everyone works for a common moral good-which is opposite of the common good of types of socialism which is purely materialistic
I suggest you read Pope Leo XIII;s encyclical
RERUM NOVARUM. I think you will will agree with it
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_15051891_rerum-novarum_en.html
ENCYCLICAL OF POPE LEO XIII
ON CAPITAL AND LABOR
Excerpt..
Private ownership, as we have seen, is the natural right of man, and to exercise that right, especially as members of society, is not only lawful, but absolutely necessary. “It is lawful,” says St. Thomas Aquinas, “for a man to hold private property; and it is also necessary for the carrying on of human existence.”” But if the question be asked: How must one’s possessions be used? - the Church replies without hesitation in the words of the same holy Doctor: “Man should not consider his material possessions as his own, but as common to all, so as to share them without hesitation when others are in need. Whence the Apostle with, ‘Command the rich of this world... to offer with no stint, to apportion largely.’”(12) True, no one is commanded to distribute to others that which is required for his own needs and those of his household; nor even to give away what is reasonably required to keep up becomingly his condition in life, “for no one ought to live other than becomingly.”(13) But, when what necessity demands has been supplied, and one’s standing fairly taken thought for, it becomes a duty to give to the indigent out of what remains over. “Of that which remaineth, give alms.”(14) It is a duty, not of justice (save in extreme cases), but of Christian charity - a duty not enforced by human law. But the laws and judgments of men must yield place to the laws and judgments of Christ the true God, who in many ways urges on His followers the practice of almsgiving - ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive”;(15) and who will count a kindness done or refused to the poor as done or refused to Himself - “As long as you did it to one of My least brethren you did it to Me.”(16) To sum up, then, what has been said: Whoever has received from the divine bounty a large share of temporal blessings, whether they be external and material, or gifts of the mind, has received them for the purpose of using them for the perfecting of his own nature, and, at the same time, that he may employ them, as the steward of God’s providence, for the benefit of others. “He that hath a talent,” said St. Gregory the Great, “let him see that he hide it not; he that hath abundance, let him quicken himself to mercy and generosity; he that hath art and skill, let him do his best to share the use and the utility hereof with his neighbor.”(17)