Is the Market Moral? A Dialogue on Religion, Economics, and Justice.

• Jurisdiction: United States
• Date: 22 March 2005
• Author: Bandow, Doug
• Published date: 22 March 2005
• Author: Bandow, Doug

Is the Market Moral? A Dialogue on Religion, Economies, and Justice Rebecca M. Blank and William McGurn Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2004, 151 pp.

Market economies have won the so-called bathtub test. Few people, even denizens of institutions historically resistant to the wiles of capitalism--academia and the environmental movement--still deny that economic freedom delivers more and better goods and services.

But critics of capitalism often make a more fundamental attack: markets are immoral. They might work, but they are unfair. In particular, their outcomes are badly flawed, requiring intrusive corrective action by government. This is the topic that spurred the debate about theology and economics between Rebecca Blank, Dean of the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy and professor of economics at the University of Michigan, and William McGurn, then an editorial writer for the Wall Street Journal--and since chosen to be President George W. Bush's chief speechwriter. The two commentators stake out their initial positions and follow with two rounds of responses.

Blank is a critic, but a well-informed one. As an academic economist she suffers none of the illusions held by those on the utopian left. In order to have a productive, prosperous society, markets are necessary but not sufficient, she contends: "Christian theology surely recognizes the fact that human beings can be selfish and self-interested, but Christian faith...