faithMile

As many of you know, there have been about 12 fires in Southern California over the past few days.  The San Diego area was hit really hard, and almost a million people have been evacuated from their homes.  As a compassionate gesture, several San Diego area hotels have offered discount rates to evacuees.  That’s great, right?  According to an economics professor, it’s horrific. Mark Steckbeck, economics professor at Hillsdale College, laments the fact that hotels offered discounted rates to fire evacuees in San Diego on this post of his blog, The Liberal Order.  According to Steckbeck, who doesn’t sound very liberal despite his blog title, the hotels made a bad thing worse by not charging full market rates or more for the rooms because higher prices would have insured that only the most desperate used the hotel rooms while others would have opted for shelters or family homes. Steckbeck says “It was a nice gesture on the part of the hotels, but I’d rather see compassion administered through the invisible hand of market prices.” Technically he is correct regarding the economics, but he is completely wrong concerning compassion.  Market prices are passive.  They do what they do, like a machine.  Compassion, on the other hand, is active.  It cannot be administered by the invisible hand of market prices.  It cannot be administered by any passive force.  Compassion means to suffer with, and market economics don’t suffer.  They don’t feel.  They cannot administer justice or mercy.  They just are.  Compassion is the realm of people. So how does human compassion reconcile itself with market forces?  This IS the market. The owners get to charge what they want, and the owners decided to be compassionate. That’s the great thing about the economy and the market. If one is fortunate enough to make one’s riches and own something, one is able to be merciful at will. As for the people who may have been willing to pay more for a room, it doesn’t matter.  When almost a million people need to be evacuated, the rooms would have filled up anyway and the compassionate gesture of reducing prices didn’t do any harm at all.  What did happen, and what will happen, is that when the fires are over, those who still have homes will return to them and those who need the hotels for longer than a few days because they no longer have homes, will have locked in reduced rates while they look for other semi-permanent housing. The hotels are still more expensive than rent, so some people will rent apartments until the insurance company, FEMA or whoever comes through with money to either buy elsewhere or rebuild. Either way, the hotels in the area were only half booked before this happened and now they are all full, so the hotel owners were able to be compassionate while still making a profit.  Isn’t that the best sort of economics?

by Granvel Johnson

A young lady approached me last night in the parking lot of Ralph’s market as
I was putting my groceries into my car. She was selling synthetic flowers. I
was not interested. She then asked if I would give her money to help her
buy some food. Again I wasn’t interested!

If I have to get up every morning drag, my butt to work (rain or shine) why
can’t she and the rest of the people who always expect me to GIVE them my
hard-earned dollars! I figured she must be trying to get money out of me so
that she could run off and by crack or some other drug – after all she didn’t
look too clean anyway. I continued putting my food and the food for my dogs into
the car. Is it possibly that my dogs will actually eat better then she tonight?

Why did those words come back to haunt me – You know the ones from the New
Testament. “When I was hungry, you fed me not”. “When I was in jail, you
didn’t visit me”. Whatever you do to the least…you do also unto me.
The scripture does not say: Feed those who lost their job in a company
downsizing. Or visit those who are in jail unjustly. Or give help to those
who are honestly struggling to get ahead.

I bought a house 2 years ago. I’m looking for a new car. Looking for a
hot tub to go into my backyard. Took a wonderful trip to Hawaii this year.
I have mutual funds, a checking account and 2 savings accounts, but I can’t give
a hungry person a dollar. To top it off I send out the Morning Meditation
everyday encouraging others to experience the love of God – Does the term
“physician heal thy self” mean anything? It does to me today.

My aunt once told me and I need to continually remind myself “All you are
required to do is give help – what they do with the money is their business.
It’s between them and God” Needless to say I caught up with the women and gave
her $2.00, she was grateful and still offered to give me the synthetic flower
(which I could suddenly see was a beautiful handmade rose). I declined
her offer and went home to exercise and feed my dogs.

Giving money to those on the street is a struggle for me. I can give to
organizations freely (Church’s, AID’s, Children’s clubs, Library, etc).
Giving to someone on the street continues to be a big struggle for me. I
guess because I tend to judge the person and his/her motives. A motive which
I can truly never know. There is another New Testament scripture reminding me
to stop judging. If you remember me in your prayers, you know what area I
need help in.

Perhaps its called “Loving thy neighbor”.

Peace and Many Blessings

In church today, our guest pastor told us the story of his wife’s difficult pregnancy. She started having contractions at 13 weeks and called her husband because she was afraid it was the beginning of a miscarriage. Her husband called his friends over to the house and all of them (more…)