We just recorded a two episodes of Dr. Frank Turek’s “I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist” podcast, over at CrossExamined.org and we talked about some of the policies of the Democrat party. Not just the ethical issues like abortion and LGBT, but also their economic policies. Whenever I could, I tried to point out where Democrat party policies had already been tried.

And here is a very good article from the Daily Signal, about how the economies of European countries are doing under similar policies as are being proposed by the Harris-Walz ticket.

It says:

New numbers say the European Union has joined Japan in the “lost decades” brigade, with per-person gross domestic product in dollar terms nearly flat since 2008.

According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, while disposable household income in the U.S. is $51,000, it’s just $39,000 in Germany, $34,000 in France, $29,000 in Italy, and $21,000 in Greece. For perspective, Mexico is about $16,000.

A very good way to measure poverty in a country is to look at GDP per capita. This is the median amount produced by individuals in that country. A high GDP per capita means high individual productivity, which typically corelates with high individual earnings.

So why do people in Europe have such low productivity, and low earnings?

Simple: Government took over. Government spending is nearly half of Europe’s GDP, which hogs physical resources—steel, workers, etc.—while predatory tax rates punish production and welfare tempts workers away. Nobody produces, everybody takes.

Add in mandates from environment to social policy that hike prices and slap straitjackets on companies, and the smart ones leave, the rest grimly soldier on, staying in business till their factories wear out, then it’s lights out.

In short, it doesn’t pay to produce in Europe.

Notice the countries that he lists: France, Germany, Greece, and Italy. These are European countries that have government control of their economies. According to the Index of Economic Freedom, which measures how socialist an economy is, Germany is ranked #18 best out of 184 countries. But France is ranked 62, Italy is ranked 81, and Greece is ranked 113. A significant cause of Germany’s poverty is the massive inflation caused by their green energy policies, bu their economy is largely free, as well as their open border immigration policy.

Many Americans on the secular left say that those countries are not doing “real” socialism. They want us to look at countries like Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. and they call what’s happening in those countries “socialism”. But those are not socialist countries. Again, according to the Index of Economic Freedom, the economies of those countries are more free than the United States. Denmark is ranked #7 for most capitalist economy. Sweden is ranked #9 and Norway is ranked #10. The difference is that those economies have very high tax rates and very high government spending.

What makes an economy “free”?

The Heritage Foundation explains in this article:

We measure economic freedom based on 12 quantitative and qualitative factors, grouped into four broad categories, or pillars, of economic freedom:

• Rule of Law (property rights, government integrity, judicial effectiveness);
• Government Size (government spending, tax burden, fiscal health);
• Regulatory Efficiency (business freedom, labor freedom, monetary freedom); and
• Open Markets (trade freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom).

Each of the twelve economic freedoms within these categories is graded on a scale of 0 to 100. A country’s overall score is derived by averaging these twelve economic freedoms, with equal weight being given to each.

Sadly, the Harris-Walz plans for the United States are NOT to turn us into Denmark or Sweden or Norway. They aren’t going for a free market economy that is isolated from government, with higher taxes and more social spending. They are going for the model of France, Italy and Greece, with higher taxes, but also reducing property rights, fiscal health, business freedom, labor freedom, monetary freedom, trade freedom, investment freedom and financial freedom. But they also want to increase activist courts, government spending, and the tax burden on businesses and individuals.

I think the articles I linked to above are worth reading, because if you are a Christian, you will find it much harder to achieve the goals you have as a Christian in an economic system that is unfree. It’s hard to think about apologetics and evangelism when you can’t afford electricy or food. That’s happening right now in secular left countries like Cuba, Venezuela and North Korea.