Jacob. He adequately proved that 401ks are not generally moral investments. Goodness is not the absence of evil, but evil is the absence of good. Trent, though a true warrior and soldier for apologetics, rested criticisms on ad hominem. I appreciate the nature of debate, but it’s important to remember that underlying the debate is a conversation between two Churchmen on important matters.
I thought Trent won convincingly. He pointed out the most important point that the church has in no way condemned this type of investing in any document or catechism. I felt like Jacob was making his own arguments citing obscure quotes from church fathers.
I worked at a Senior Center and it was a SAD place. I think that it is a good idea to invest in our kids. Kids in daycare are accustomed to not seeing their parents for long periods of time, divorce makes it even worse. Putting our aging parents in nursery home needs to be the last resort. I’m Hispanic so maybe it is acceptable in American culture. My grandparents had 9 kids and their children have looked after them. Some families even fight to care for their poor elderly parents. We live in a society that views the elderly, sick, disabled, and children as a burden. See it this way, you GET to care for your parents in a similar way that they cared for you.
It's an American thing and honestly a product of a culture that doesn't value life and treats people like trash at all stages of life, and particularly when they're unable to care for themselvez.
Agree it’s sad. Focusing on 401ks is an unproductive way of dealing with this solution. Being with (the ever increasing amount of) old people is way better. Or seeking to buy local and live local to increase the # of generations living near each other
As a Filipino, it’s sad to see so many of my fellow Americans just shoving their parents in nursing homes. When I was a child we took my grandparents into our home. It was a big deal and it actually caused a rift between my parents and one of my aunts because my grandma wanted to live with us. I have problems with my parents but I could NEVER stick them in one of those care homes. I’ve seen how so many of them are treated. Many of these old folks haven’t seen their kids in years. So sad.
@@Jerds after the COVID nonsense, there's 0% chance I'll let my parents live in one of those things. Someone else said that 401(k)s don't help the problem but I'd disagree since family members aren't always equipped to handle their aged parents and they might help defray costs of things like an in-home nurse. Also, maybe it's just me, but if my kids have to live in a bigger house to take care of me, I want to help with some of those costs if I can.
@@Jerds an anecdote, my wife's grandmother was a prisoner in one of those homes during COVID. Couldn't leave her room. Couldn't see anyone. Just expected to sit there an be a vegetable. Poor woman died about a year and a half ago from, you guessed it, COVID. Despite all the best efforts they couldn't contain it in the homes and Dick Levine had the nerve to take his mother out of her nursing home right before he locked them down.
Thanks for hosting, this was a very good discussion. I’ve really enjoyed New Polity’s work on this topic, but I do think the position that the 401k is immoral is quite a reach. IMO, Jacob’s message is much more potent when posed as a way to grow in virtue rather than to avoid sin/immortality. Trent hit on this in his closing argument. I’ve personally benefitted a lot from Jacob’s perspectives, but I fear that the immoral argument may harm others. I personally didn’t enjoy the formality of the debate. It would have been more enjoyable if all three of you were in the same place enjoying a pint and having a natural conversation - this would have made the conversation more fraternal and charitable.
My fear is that someone will actually listen to Jacob and later find that decades of inflation has made their “cash savings” almost worthless. He did not even acknowledge the problem of inflation, or how to hedge against it, as Trent pointed out that some people are so poor in retirement that they have to eat cat food. And buying gold as a retirement savings is absolutely insane, considering the price of gold is WILDLY volatile, which means it has not maintained its purchasing power at all times. Jacob also did not address that yes, 401(k)s are relatively new; social security was created before that… but why?! Social Security was created before that because people were destitute in retirement! It was a safety net created in response to a problem that definitely existed. I have no desire to bankrupt my kids when I retire because I took Jacob’s retirement investment advice.
@@definitelynotaheretic.7295 bro you are not retiring. Every 10-12 years the stock market goes into correction and people get a haircut on their 401k (which was never meant to be a sole retirement account. It was to supplement a pension), and often 401ks do well for buying the few stocks that go up high vs the vast majority that go up slowly. Our economy is so bad that the dollar will be worthless in 10 years, and with rumors of war between China and the US, you will not have anything in that 401k money trap.
I don’t know if either party mentioned this- 401ks have a clause where in times of emergency 401ks and retirement accounts pre-tax can be confiscated via a new law. Our debt to gdp is 120% currently- so how is congress going to pay off that debt?
As someone who watches a lot of political/social debates, I just want to take the time to appreciate how even at its most tense moments, just how civil a debate between two catholics is. I feel like I could genuinely enjoy hanging out with either of these guys. Truly wonderful how faith can bring even people who disagree together.
I think both did a great job! I think it is true that it is generally moral to invest in 401k, but from the standpoint of building the kingdom of God, Jacob Imam seems to be right. The difference between asking the question: "What are we allowed to do?" and "What is the most authentic Christian way to live?"
As the debate premise made clear, the question had to do with 401k investment as something "generally immoral." So Jacob was not arguing for the most virtuous or most ideal or most conducive to advancing a pious society or anything else other than affirming the premise of the debate: investing in 401ks is generally immoral (ie. it is against the moral law.)
I listened to the podcast version of this debate, but felt called to comment here. This was a fantastic debate on an issue I have been struggling with. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing both sides of the argument, and appreciated how Jacob and Trent were both respectful of their opponent's stance.
I think it shouldn't be respectful. He's going to be responsible for someone throwing away their savings while he still makes money preaching this destructive message.
One more thing is that differentiating between buying a stock in an IPO versus buying on the secondary market is a distinction without difference. The first would not exist without the latter. People invest in IPOs knowing they will be able to sell their shares later. Buying stock in a company materially helps that company grow and employ more people which build society. That doesn’t mean that we should invest in an evil company just because they employ people, but it certainly does not make it generally immoral to invest in a 401(k)
Read Guido Hulsmann's "The Spiritual Effects of Fiat Inflation" as the antidote to boomer economics and as a critique of Imam. Fiat inflation is the problem, not speculation.
It seems like there is a large gray area with this conversation, but I think that the ideal is leaning more towards what Jacob has been saying. One side is building a town of large families and small businesses, and the other produces a town filled with global corporations fueled by everyone 401k’s that uproot local traditions/businesses and pay low wages.
I do think that is a key point. The argument is not what is better, but what is permitted. I don’t think you would get any argument from Trent that an investment in your community or with your family that you actively participate in would be better than investing in the stock market, but that doesn’t make investing in the stock market wrong in general
Was hoping to find a comment from someone that at least has a basic understanding of finance but I guess I'll have to make it. I urge everyone to completely ignore this debate as it is between two people that seem to lack even the basic understanding of finance. The purpose of owning stocks/funds in retirement is NOT to speculate i.e. buy low and sell high. It is to own stocks that generate income in the form of dividends (direct reoccurring payment of profits to a shareholder). This allows you to have a passive income (make money when you can no longer work). Unlike what was presented in this debate, being a shareholder actually makes you a shareholder in the company. This means that the natural end of a stock is to pay its shareholders in the form of a dividend. It is true that young companies do not pay dividends but investors are speculating on the future potential of the company to generate dividends! To be a share holder of a speculative Growth stock means you are in a sense like an owner, putting off current personal profits to receive future payment in the form of dividends. If you buy a substantial portion (even 0.1%) of a potential billion dollar company, this means that when they do pay dividends you will receive a hefty income. But you are also accepting the risk of being an owner of a company that could fail. Now, each individual does not need to choose these stocks individually. A 401K typically purchases funds where it aggregates the risk of the individual stocks into a group. These funds/groups are normally broken down into risk profile. These risk profiles reflect the state of the company. Are they a young company that could fail to produce a dividend in the future? That is a high risk speculative Growth asset. Are they a well established company that pays a reliable dividend? Then they are a reliable source of income and are considered a Value asset. Making a group of stocks/fund that has diversity and reliability is the art of what these financial institutions do. What someone can do over the course of their lifetime is buy riskier Growth funds in their youth when they can afford more risk, then gradually transition to Value funds to provide income for your retirement. Please don't let your blind hatred of things you cannot control (Jacob's view) or your lack of understanding (Trent's view) affect your financial future. It is hard for me to stress the fact that the financial sector actually does provide a valuable service that both men seem to lack an understanding of. The fact that both failed to understand even the most basic purpose of being a shareholder should be a red flag. St. Thomas would at least evaluate the teleology of being a shareholder before passing moral judgment on the whole idea. Unless the argument is that owning a company is intrinsically evil... The future to a large extent is unwritten and risk assessment is real part of life. Disclaimer, I am an engineer not a financial expert. I am merely presenting the basic information people should have about investing. Getting rich quick (greed) is a natural vice of man but it is not the purpose of investing in stocks.
You are right in theory - what you describe is what stocks SHOULD be. However the vast majority of the activity on the stock market has to do with speculation, and dividends are rare.
@@romanslav827 Do you have evidence to support this claim? Like I said I am no expert but just a quick google search tells me that ~53% of stocks pay dividends. It seems the majority of stocks pay dividends. What metric are you using to evaluate relative volume of speculation compared to rarity of dividends? Sure, speculation gets the most media coverage. But this is equivalent to the lottery generating more excitement than the details of your local small business economy. Even by this data, ~43% of stocks are speculative. I tried to make another key point to justify speculation on these assets. Which is sort of Trent's point of trying to nuance the definition of speculation but lacked the technical knowledge to do so. Speculation on these assets is contingent on future dividend payments/profits of the company. Jacob presents stock market speculation like a Ponzi scheme, where the asset's value is contingent only on relative amount of buying and selling of that asset. However, actual stocks (including speculative stocks) can be evaluated by the technical fundamentals of the company. Due to Federal Reserve behavior in recent years fundamentals have become partially decoupled from price (due to asset price inflation of their quantitative easing policy) and the overall market has become more speculative as a result. But the government can only make the market lie for so long. That is why with the current combination of inflation and recession the most speculative assets have been hurt the most (they were the most inflated). Overall your point is very valid, but "what stocks SHOULD be" still exists. Personally, I stay away from these highly speculative stocks. But even these highly speculative stocks still provide some value and aren't solely Ponzi schemes. The stock market in this video is almost depicted like crypto/bitcoin (maybe because the media conflation of the two?). Crypto has no fundamental objective value, no tangible service to non-criminal behavior (primarily because the transaction price is non-competitive), and the price is purely set by speculation. Frankly, Jacob's arguments almost map perfectly to crypto and if he was talking about crypto I would be 100% onboard...
@@weingo939 I specifically just adjusted my 401(k) to buy more dividend generating stocks. So you can definitely adjust it for dividends instead of mere speculation. Overall I generally agree with you that discussing how stocks actually work would have benefitted the discussion. I personally had a similar objection to Jacob's opening statement where he was neglecting a huge part of what owning stock meant.
If anybody who lands on Jacob's side of this could answer this I'd appreciate it: If working a job for, let's say Microsoft, is licit because the money I make from it goes to my basic necessities and those of my family right now, why is using a 401k to provide for my basic necessities in my old age immoral. Granted I think it would be superior to rely upon family and community first, but that wouldn't mean a 401k would therefore be wrong, just a less desirable choice. And if a 401k is wrong intrinsically, what are the things I could do now to help provide for a future me (other than stashing money/gold/property under a mattress).
Because working at Microsoft is WORKING, while infesting in Microsoft though a 401k is speculating, and that was a major point of his argument. Jacob's critique was not so much about what you do with the money, but what the church has said about how it makes the money.
401(k)s are closer to gambling than ownership, as Trent concedes. Gambling is not intrinsically wrong, as Trent points out. Gambling becomes immoral when you risk your ability to provide for your own and others' basic necessities, as the Catechism teaches. So using a 401(k) for retirement is immoral. Instead, use your money for: 1. True ownership of productive property, on which you work and from which you receive just reward. Examples include land, homes, businesses, animals, gardens, tools, and skills. 2. Buying friends through almsgiving, liberality, and magnificence, so that when that when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting dwellings.
To be clear he wasn't saying it's intrinsically wrong, but "generally", meaning it could be morally licit in cases of necessity. I believe he would say the same about the Microsoft job. If it was *necessary* for you to work at Microsoft, then despite their illicit behavior it would be okay (as long as you weren't directly participating in the illicit behavior) but if you had another better option you would be obligated to take that. Moving to the 401k I think he would say that if you're not already at the edge of retirement then you have ample opportunity to make preparations for your old age in more moral areas than the 401k and are therefore obligated to choose them instead. As to the second part of your question, I would say that other than kids/gold/property the best thing is just becoming a cherished member of the community. If people find out the elderly guy they've known for years is about to become homeless, I doubt even non-Christians would be unwilling to offer significant assistance. (Sure you probably wouldn't have 5-star arrangements, but they'd almost certainly get you a roof, bed, and meals).
The conditions for condemned speculation are very narrow. Keep In mind that Leo XIII and other popes have promoted a doctrine of wages that does include opportunity to save. Much of what is spoken about here on both sides does confirm that this topic is not outside a realm of prudential judgment. That is, the teaching on saving via 401k-like vehicles is not definitive, IMO. An investment and an illicit speculative trade sometimes are hard to distinguish. A possible criteria was considered by Nell-Bruening, the notion that speculation does involve mental work. I think that is helpful but more to the point: secondary markets (yes, they don’t involve your handing money over for production of capital) serve a variety of social purposes that are good.
To add to the investment side of things: Pope Leo XIII in his encylical Rerum Novarum, paragraphs 13 and 46 suggests that a father be thrifty and by cutting down expenses, attain productive property and pass it down through inheritance. This is considered natural and not inhertly evil. Productive property is vague, and you can take it many ways. You could pass on the tools of a business to your son, so he can run the family business while you take a back seat. You could also provide him a car so he can get to work, a house so he can have excess cash to provide for you or lower the burden on him to provide you one, or you could also go the full sustainable route and provide for all your direct expenses (self-sustainable farm, solar panels, well etc) so the burden on him is light. Those are far easier to control for moral culpability because you know your son better than (insert stock here). Whenever you physicaly work on something, you control its use. Financial instruments are also another legitimate way but your ability to enact moral control may be muddled. Stocks and Bonds offer a cut of the profits but just like any business, if you are profiting and taking a back seat to moral evils (abortion, contraception, nuclear weapons) or allow a slave-camp in your supply line (Apple with the Weiger(?) Muslims) you could be morally culpable for those profits that were attained immorally (in a distant sense but still exists). Even if you never received cash from the company, there is still an element of profiting from those types of evil. The way to counteract those evils is to fight against it via shareholder meetings and such and either voice your opinion (if it's a matter that is not intrinsically evil.) or divest (sell out). The issue with the 401k is that you are disincentive to divest because you take an income tax hit and a 10% penalty, which adds up to be less than you originally invested sometimes. Since 401ks also (mostly) only allow you to own shares of a mutual fund, not the companies directly, you do not get a seat at the shareholder meeting (unless you score big time and can incest in a Catholic fund that votes KoC and such). Most investment firms do not vote at all and take a permanent back seat. So 401ks disinvetivize your divestment and can nullify your ability to practice your required stewardship of the businesses you own (techniacalyy you own the stock, therfore you have a stake). If you just own a business or stock without the 401k tack-on, you can reasonably fulfill your duties, just do diligent research and stay up to date and informed. And with things more close to you (son's car, family business) you have a direct say in thier use, and the work required to fully understand the moral implications may be vastly less. If you give your son a car for the strict purpose of getting to and from work, and he plows 12 people over with it, you know you only gave it to him to go to work. With 401ks not so much. If you get a share of Apple, you have no managerial say as to how your money is used, they just get to use it for thier ends. Your only option is to propose a shareholder referendum (which usually requires a big minority stake) or just divest. Therfore is better to fulfill the direct need for productive investment as close as possible to yourself (since you can more easily direct the Catholic good from it) or if you need to go to the market (some people need to, no judge), invest in the companies directly so you can clearly steward your claim correctly by Catholic Social Teaching (divest and vote) and stay informed, up to date and ready to exercise the Catholic will on that company. Edited for more clarity.
All Jacob does is beg the question. “You’re only investing to make a profit” “Actually I want to use the money to do good” “Well that’s utilitarian!!!!1 you can’t justify merely wanting to make a profit by wanting not merely to make a profit!!!” What a joke
Agreed. Stop buying from big corporations and buy local or produce it yourself. Learn to maintain your house and your car. Build real community with your parish where people are giving to each other. Get out of big cities. Have a big family.
Using Jacobs example about lumber speculation shows his misunderstanding of market fundamentals (not that Trent did a good job of rebutting him). First- labor (that is non-evil), to seek a profit is not wrong. I understand that ONLY seeking a profit may be wrong but I am not sure about that as I am not moral theologian, however that is not what is happening in the case stated above. Both profit and a value-add is occurring. Obviously the main driver is to seek a profit. But that is the case with all work. Most people go to work to make money & yes they are also contributing to the common good but that is rarely the driving factor both now and in history. When markets "speculate" they are doing a very laborious scientific inquiry about the price of future goods. What drives the price of the current and future price is supply and demand which is driven by scarcity. So when an analyst "speculates" about lumber he see's that lumber is plentiful and therefore cheaper today but because of his research and inquiry (which is labor) he expects scarcity in the future. So what the analyst does is take and buy the "plenty" and stores it (which is also labor and has cost). Now because of the research and inquiry the analyst did, he predicts that for whatever reason there will be scarcity in the future of lumber. When that occurs the analyst provides a service and product of providing what he or she obtained during the plenty out on the market to satisfy the scarcity. Now he makes a profit for doing this as anyone who works seeks to do. But what the analyst who speculated was doing is providing to the common good when there is scarcity. Now he makes a profit for this but that is because of his labor, intellect and opportunity cost and sacrifice he made by not spending the money else where. Almost always the only reason for price change is scarcity.
These guys also don't understand net present value. No one buys and sells stock without expecting a dividend at some point. Google trades 20x its earning because investors bring to the present value future cash flows paid out in the form of dividends. Apple has never paid a dividend but it will in the future. How much will it pay out? Exactly 152 dollars per share in the net present value. (which is the current share price).
@@danielballabani1232 You are simply bolstering the case against speculation. Sophisticated programmers may employ their skills to craft ransomware programs that will encrypt all the computers of businesses, banks, government offices, or personal computers and charge a fee to unlock the data. Or perhaps they simply sell their software to bad actors. Maybe those bad actors spend a lot of their money of these programs instead of other things that would give them less money and spend a lot of their time sending phishing emails. Either of these are doing "work" and using skills, intellect, time, effort, and everything the speculator is doing. But all of these people are doing illicit work that harms others and benefits nobody, adding no value to help others. At every point in your scenario, the lumber speculator harms others and only profits personally. While buying excess in the surplus, he increases the demand artificially himself, preventing others from buying at an even lower surplus price. When selling during the period of scarcity, he deprives others of the fair value of the lumber goods they are trying to sell who did not hoard excess lumber in a warehouse. Imagine instead that the speculator used his knowledge of fluctuations in lumber supply and demand to purchase excess wood to build extra furniture in his carpentry business, or invest in a carpenter friend to help buy extra wood to made extra furniture over a period of surplus. Then, when lumber prices are high, they have spent this whole time adding value through their skills to sell cheaper furniture at a lower price than it would have been if they had to buy all that lumber from a speculator. This is the type of investing and value adding, people can actually use furniture to eat off of instead of the floor, or prepare food on their wood countertops. Or maybe ASP or HfH can afford to build cheap homes for the poor to live in or repair their leaking roof.
In your example he is speculating on the future price of furniture by selling it during a wood shortage, which will cause a furniture shortage and drive up the price, which you praise him for lowering. Also, is it good or bad to bring extra supply in during a shortage? When he brings over surplus furniture you bemoan his effects on the high lumber price, yet praise it when dine with furniture.
It would have been nice if the debate would have been on the broader question can I invest in mutual funds or ETFs? Trent seemed to recognize this is the broader question. Jacob wanted to throw out anything related to the broader question pre 401k.
I liked the debate and although Jacob gave me things to think about, I remembered the parable of the talents. Two of the three invested the talents given them in order to increase (obtain profit) and return that to their master... who commended them and rewarded them. Another parable of an owner who put everything into "planning for his future" and he died without benefitting from hus investment. This parable illustrates the need for prudence and not being selfish. The owner should have helped the poor and put away a certain amount for the future... being one example of prudence. Thank you Matt for another thoughtful debate!
Good point, although I would point out that Jacob was not opposed to investments. It's important to remember that investing in general and investing in the stock market are very different things (although in the modern day it's become synonymous). Nothing like the stock market (or 401k's) existed in the time of Christ, so in the parable of the talents the investments that the servants had made would have been directly to businesses (likely local and small) that they supported. In a literal reading the parable actually speaks against fearful saving, which is in many ways what a 401k is.
@@alexv7113 I would say to a point maybe. The point Jacob was making about 401K's was they are just for profit and that's what made them bad. My point about the talents was they were used and invested to make an ROI which is what was praised snd rewarded by their master. The one who didn't try to get a profitable return was rebuked. The other parable could be comparable to a 401K only if someone put all their resources into it (or any other investment) without giving to God, giving to the poor and/or their family at some capacity before investing some into their future. That's just my take though. Definitely not magisterial. lol
The first parable was about growth based on work and the results were not for himself. In addition, the parable is instructing on stewardship, work, and accountability rather than what is an ethical investment. In the second parable, as Christians our future is heaven so unless he went to hell it is hard to conclude that he did not benefit but certainly your point of helping the poor is a great one. Most of the time focusing on yourself could mean focusing on nothing but focusing on others may be focus will bring focus on you. Great parables though
If something as common and deeply linked to peoples' ability to support themselves (ESPECIALLY the elderly and sick) as 401K's were generally immoral (because of speculation) and the Church did not teach this in a clear way through its proper means and channels, we would have an even larger issue than the dissent we have among the issues that ARE clear. There's no obligation on the part of the laity to apply moral principles the way Jacob is doing here, in fact it's probably dangerous.
This would also need to extend to pensions, as pension contributions are often invested for return by the companies/governments that pay them out. Imam's idea of saving via "cash gold and real estate" would leave one worse off financially and also potentially worse off morally - speculating with REAL ESTATE potentially deprives a young family of an affordable home! My mom did not save for retirement at all, and my only sibling is not doing well financially, so it is up to me to financially support her while I also try to start a family of my own. It's not an easy situation to be in. I don't think saving to avoid a similar burden on my own kids, or maybe even being able to help them, is immoral.
CFA charterholder here. Imam fundamentally misunderstands the stock market. For one: the stock is a share of ownership in the company that you can exercise - not simply a ticket. Two, the stock market's purpose is to give liquidity to shareholders, distribute ownership of corporations, and raise capital. The latter of these is what Imam would be more interested in. The fluctuations in the price of shares gives companies better terms when raising additional capital for expanding their services and increasing their cash flows. I would ask Imam this: is it immoral to buy out someone else's ownership in a private company? If the answer is no, long term investments in the stock market is not immoral.
I really think Jacob’s definition of speculation and his early criticisms only apply to day trading and arbitrage seeking, not long term investing. Speculation is a kind of investing, not synonymous with investing Coming from a Catholic financial advisor
Agreed. His definitions were not nuanced and blurred too many distinctions. Following Jacob's logic, it would seem to lead to the conclusion that all public ownership of companies is wrong.
@@jerodfrank6419 Yes indeed, even providing seed money for a startup would be illicit in his view. I also found his critique to be very American, in the sense that he, rightly, sees some of the pitfalls of American Capitalistic consumerism and castigates the entire Capitalistic system overall. Sure, we don't all need iPhones, but he can also see the benefit in childhood mortality decreasing?
Thanks Matt for connecting these two on this subject. I knew they had two entirely different views when I initially heard jacob speak on this subject on your channel right after I heard Trent affirming retirement investments on his channel.
Gotta say man, the parable of the talents really does not support the 401(k) route as all, seeing as Jesus was specifically meaning that parable as a discussion of building God's kingdom (using the king's money to make the king more money), not using the king's money to make ourselves more money.
My takeaway: I'm more inspired by Jacob here, but more relieved by Trent. And for me that's interesting to reflect on. It feels like Jacob is calling us higher, which I _want_ as a Christian. At the same time, I'm working my way out of debt and my workplace provides this kind of investment-matching for me (which I do use). Guess where that leaves me right now is not moving my actions yet (as Trent points out the magisterium seems not to _require_ this, and in my circumstances I feel there's serious reason for being careful), but I want to hear more from people like Jacob. I _want_ to hear a robust plan for an alternative Christian economic model that I can participate in; I want to be called higher and just know that whatever I do is consistent with the goodness God calls us to.
My question is if 401K's are immoral, then should people be working for companies that provide 401K's? By association aren't those companies immoral? This sounds like an argument made by someone who has the luxury of deciding how to invest (moral or otherwise) because they make a good income. "I know several people who retired with nothing but cash savings". So do I, but that is the exception, and they were making a ton of money to be able to do it as well. Somebody who's making poverty level income, yeah right......
Jacob addressed the first part of your question in the debate. Working a job provides for your primary needs, so while that job is the only feasible option for providing for your family it is perfectly licit to work it. Jacob's problem with the 401k itself if that you invest in it using your excess funds, not the primary funds you need to stay alive.
@@BrazilianPride22041 Work somewhere else. Can't have it both ways, IMO. Seems to be a sliding morality scale going on there by someone who doesn't have to worry about money (Jacob). I've seen the utter devastation wrought by not having enough to care for yourself when you can no longer work first hand, both to the individual and their family. If we're going to allow exceptions, that situation is a greater morality issue in my opinion, than investing in a mutual fund.
@@Bloozestringer If you can work somewhere else, you should. Did you not read that I wrote 'The only feasible option'? Most who have significant excess funds enough to be investing in a 401k are not living in destitution, and likely will not in the future. You're making a utilitarian argument about allowing a small evil in order that good may come of it. Address specifically the morality of the act of investing in a 401k, that's what the debate was about. I will grant you that Jacob's case is made significantly easier if he provides feasible structured steps to care for ourselves in old age, other than 'return to family and community' which is easier said than done.
@@TheNYsoxfan, only you and the Lord know if it is the only feasible option for you to work in order to provide for you and your family right now. I couldn't make that specific judgment for you. If one answers the question in good faith and trust I don't think it'll impair one's relationship with God.
There are more fundamental economic and moral presuppositions both debaters are assuming that must be resolved first. What is work? Is a certain level of work required to generate value? What is value? How is it determined? When are value levels moral or immoral (this gets into usury because interest rates are just prices which are measurements of perceived value)? These are just a few examples. I think we need a 3-4 hour dialogue.
Yes, those would have been useful things to clear up. What we really need is someone like you to moderate it and ask these probing questions. Matt Frad is great, but he is a very laid-back moderator, and doesn't really have the background to know what questions to ask and when it is necessary to insist that the debaters clearly define their terminology.
No horse in the race here. Don't even think that 401ks are a thing in this part of the world, at least not a major one (and certainly not with that name...) but it did seem that Jacob went into this one very surgically and Trent was more broad with his use and explanations of some terminology embellished with great rhetoric and technicalities. For me investing was always something you do because you believe in someone or in their idea/work, and you do it seeking their good as well as seeing that the good of their work is also generally benefitial. I don't know why one would attach pursuing a profit onto such action? I gave money to people/causes so I could help them to good. Seeing their good work being aided in that way was more than enough for me, since I didn't spend so much that it would endanger the needs of my family and I felt called to invest into things greather or somewhat other than my own work. Again, I don't know if doing that while having an idea of monetary profit from it, is a good thing. It just seems like good ol' greed. Don't know who won. Would be very interested in hearing Matt unpack this one. I agree with Trent in a "poetic" sense that , no, you're not an archdemon if you invested this way and that good can come from it in some cases. At the same time, I get a strong "Guys, we christians should know better" sense from Jacob that I do very much like.
I'm not so concerned with who won, but Jacob's definitely correct. The only real counter-argument Trent makes is that Jacob has the "burden of proof." I'm not sure what Trent would consider "proof" of something being immoral, but he seems to suggest that unless and until the Magisterium explicitly says so, nothing can be known to be evil. The silliness of that argument should be obvious. If we are endowed with a conscience which is informed by grace, we are capable as Christians of realizing something is wrong - whether or not the Magisterium happens to have said so. The stated purpose of the Magisterium is to interpret and preserve the truths of the faith transmitted through Scripture and Tradition. The idea, then, that the Magisterium must figure out every possible evil in the world and forbid it before all of us conscienceless Christians partake is a very weak one. Finally, there are countless examples of evils recognized by the Magisterium AS A RESULT OF Christian scholars like Jacob making that case. So, again, the notion that we cannot or should not trust any Christian's case for something being wrong before the Magisterium declares it is foolish. Jacob provides many excellent points which Trent fails to refute.
I've never seen Trent so outmatched in a debate. Not coincidentally, it is likely rooted in a very American attachment to markets and wealth. Church teaching is clear our economy is unjust, and Jacob made that beautifully clear.
I think a lot of people have been looking forward to a debate on this topic, so I was really hyped when I saw it scheduled! I lean heavily towards Jacob's position of more radically living out our faith, but I have to admit Trent is the better debater and mostly carried the day. Trent's gambling analogy, and argument from lack of specific magisterial prohibition, quite convincingly defeat the thesis that to seek profit alone is intrinsically immoral (although I'm not sure this is exactly what Jacob means, or if that proposition even makes sense). The compromise position that I think Jacob should have argued for is that investment can be spiritually dangerous or harmful, not that it is "generally immoral" - a term he equivocates on (e.g. attacking Trent for consequentialist reasoning when he describes the good that can come from it, which is invalid reasoning if the act in question is intrinsically immoral, *but* Jacob's definition of "generally immoral" seems to preclude that). He builds a pretty strong case regarding how it can easily lead one away from virtue and encourages the proliferation of structures of sin, however, and how we need to spend our money positively building up the City of God instead of accepting the structures of the City of Man A few other comments: - Jacob's quote from St Thomas on solicitude is actually a reference to Q47, Art. 10 in the Summa, on whether prudence applies to the governing of many. The word "solicitude" doesn't appear in the New Advent translation, so that might be a bit confusing - Jacob should have hit back on the example of the Bishop exerting his ownership in Walgreens by saying that that's not what people generally do with their investments, that investments are generally for the purpose of making money alone, and that that case would be moral. I feel that red herring wasted quite a bit of time and obscured his actual point - Trent is wrong on the issue of usury: usury is the charging of *any* interest on a *personally-secured* loan, where the lender can pursue the borrower personally for the capital lent, regardless of anything that happens to the borrower. This is in contrast to a non-recourse loan secured only by some specific property. Credit cards and student loans, then, are instances of usury by banks against individuals - but interest on a bond or deposit, which is secured only by the assets of the company or bank, are not. This is clearly and explicitly taught in multiple Papal bulls, but de-emphasised today. Read Zippy Catholic's usury FAQ for details and rationales. - On that note, I think what Jacob was going at is the neglect/reluctance of many prelates to speak on difficult topics of sexual morality, not that the bishops can just be ignored. The point is, the recent reluctance of the magisterium to emphasise certain points should not be taken as a rejection of those points. Trent counters this ably though, by pointing out that the magisterium has never taught specifically that investment in the stock market is forbidden, and that the evidence weighs against Jacob's definition of speculation
Trent's gambling analogy, and argument from lack of specific magisterial prohibition, quite convincingly defeat the thesis that to seek profit alone is intrinsically immoral (although I'm not sure this is exactly what Jacob means, or if that proposition even makes sense). Yeah, was wondering what he meant by that too. Technically as Catholics, we should be detached from all things that are not God, and should only use things insofar as they pertain to our final end. However, this does not imply that we should not seek lesser goals in our efforts to seek that final end. Ie: there is nothing immoral about training for a few hours a week to become a fantastic soccer player. It should be ordered to higher ends (ie: physical fitness in order to have more energy to achieve other things, also just the fact that recreation is healthy psychologically), but in the moment of the game, it's perfectly fine for a competitive person to be completely fixated on scoring as many goals as possible. Of course, this must be done within the confines of the game - no fouls, cheating, etc - which is analogous to morality is the capitalist marketplace. So, in the sense that we should always be oriented in some way to our final end, sure. But there is nothing wrong with seeking lesser goals in the meantime which do not conflict with that. "Profit for profit alone" almost seems like semantics. What someone uses their profits for cannot be ascertained from how they achieved them. The fact that I made profits on the stock market, a personal business, speculation, etc, tells you absolutely nothing about whether I will use them for good or bad. So, to imply that speculation seems to fail right at the definitional level. There also is a valid economic critic I think about the idea that speculation inherently adds nothing. Speculation is similar to insurance in that it prices in risks and uncertainties. Information has real, economic value. Assuming the speculator takes the full brunt of his possible failure (ie: no capitalized gain and socialized losses), then there is real value added to society by the presence of speculation. Iman didn't even acknowledge the existence of this argument, but simply assumed that speculation was a zero-sum game. (This is different from the question of whether it's parasitical in practice as there are substantial distortions in the financial markets which detach normal price signals from reality. Unfortunately in our current environment there is also the moral hazard problem where it is possible to game the system in your favor by bribing/"lobbying" the right officials). Unfortunately, this discussion needed a lot more nuance and rigour than it was given.
I do have to disagree with Trent regarding gold. Jacob is correct. We have a fiat currency so that means the dollar changes value, not necessarily gold. People buy gold because whether or not the government ruins our currency by over printing and inflation, they can still exchange gold at that particular moment to keep the same value and buy the same goods. Investing in gold is more of an assurance of purchasing power and protecting against people ruining your personal wealth
Yes, since gold still isn't used as money universally in the modern era, its real value does fluctuate beyond is merely inflation adjusting movement. Even when gold WAS used as money universally, its real value still moved since the supply of goods, services, and population usually increased at a faster rate than the supply of useable gold. This is "built in" price deflation, meaning the gold will be increasing in value relative to really things. In fact, over short periods of time, this can even happen with paper currencies like the dollar when they rise against other currencies on foreign exchange markets because of tightening monetary conditions in which banks stop making loans, effectively sucking money back out of the economy. I doubt Jacob would say that we can therefore not use money at all. Or would he? After all, whenever you buy something with dollars, you are selling the dollars themselves in exchange for goods or services, and whenever you sell something you only do so by buying dollars. If the money goes up in value that is capital gain in real terms, I am very concerned with the logical ramifications of mr. imam's view. I fear they would in practice inevitably lead to the ruin of civilization.
Gold has much more volitility than the dollar. One reason for this is that the dollar is only a means of exchange and gold is an industrial and use commodity.
Buying stocks (or putting money into a 401k) does NOT equate to speculation. It means buying a percentage of a company in exchange for the right to a percentage of that company's profits. It is not necessarily even about buying low and selling high. For example, even if you knew that a particular stock would stay flat in value for many years to come, you might still invest in that company for the sake of receiving dividends from its profits. Buying a stock is mutually beneficial for both the buyer and seller. The buyer gets the benefit of a percentage of the company and the seller gets the benefit of cash which might be needed for other good pursuits. Also, while it is true that when you buy a stock you theoretically raise its value (due to increasing scarcity) it's also true that when you sell it one day, you will also decrease its price for the next buyer to benefit from company ownership. So buying stocks is not simply a matter of artificially pumping up fake wealth. Please do not empty your 401k. None of the Church fathers said anything about 401ks. This is nothing more than a theological opinion.
Trent praises our secular gains that come from investing. Jacob bemoans our spiritual decay that comes from investing. What does it benefit a man to gain the world if he loses his soul. Trent defends what limits of one should be able to without completely falling out of the Church. Jacob calls us to a higher way of living so that we can better love our neighbor and live the Kingdom of God.
I disagree with your implication. The debate was to address a very particular point about the liceity of a particular action, not whether it is the best action. More generally it was a question about an aspect of truth. Is A the case, or is it not the case? Having a good understanding of the truth is foundational to being able to make moral judgements about the best way to act in light of that truth. Narrowing your attention to focus on a particular topic of truth does not imply that you are neglecting all other forms of virtue. If Jacob's true intention in this debate was to do what you say, that's great, but it wasn't supposed to be the topic of debate. And therefore only served to confuse the issue.
People aren't ready for Jacob's more radical view of money (I'm not sure I am either)...but I think he proposes the higher way and one that Jesus would ascribe most closely to.
I'm not sure who I would say "won" the debate, but what I am sure of is that out of everyone I've ever known/know of, Jacob most clearly embodies the peace and joy in Christ that I most desire to have in my life. Accordingly, I'm inclined towards his argument on the topic, which of course stems from his unflappable trust in the Lord.
Be careful with that line of logic. Even Jesus says that the children of the light are not as prudent as the children of this world. Therefore Jacob's peace or innocence is still be compatible with ignorance or naivete.
In minute 38, Trent made Jacob look like a hypocrite. But even if Jacob is a “hypocrite” by using these technologies himself, does not mean that his argument against 401K is wrong.
It gave Jacob a chance to clarify a distinction, if such a distinction existed (I wouldn't' think it does). That fact that Jacob dismissed the question as not relevent implies either dishonesty or that he didn't understand the point. In charity I'd assume the latter, which would in fact, harm his argument.
@@willing_spirit6830 Ideally, we wouldn't live in a complex economy with rampant inflation and devalued fiat currency. Ideally, people could just save their earnings without getting punished by this insidious invisible tax.
@@24erstad True, ideally we would have a good and righteous king on earth to which every knee would bow. It may be unreasonable to pretend living by such ideals is possible before the 2nd coming...
@@willing_spirit6830 Yes, idealistic, but not reality, as 401Ks have nothing to do with speculation or employees buying low and selling high, doesn't happen within the 401K construct
Jacob did a great job of explaining why 401ks are bad. Trent did a good job of explaining why many people feel it's necessary to use them and that the catholic magisterium doesn't prohibit it. I'm still not sure whether it's moral or not though. Jacob made a great point about how asking "Where's the line? What are the exact rules I can't break?" is not the mind of Christ which we should strive to have. This is one of the biggest themes Paul develops throughout Romans. On the other hand though, it is a good thing to manage our finances wisely in this corrupt world in order to provide for our families.
Was contraception bad prior to Humanae Vitae? if so Then Trent's insistance that something be found by name in teaching falls falt to Jacob's point that if the underlying principles the Church has prohibit something then the thing itself is also prohibited.
I'm not sure Jacob did do that. I didn't find his premise that economic speculation provides no useful societal benefit convincing. Without it, his whole "profit alone" point doesn't hold water. Speculation in theory is useful because it helps to price in risk. Something like stock price (as well as commodities like lumber, and other assets like real estate) is inherently uncertain in the future. Speculation puts a present day price on future things, and therefore adds an element of certainty to society/the economy. It's very similar to insurance, from an economic standpoint. The argument that buying a stock (through a 401k/mutual fund or directly, whichever) doesn't benefit the company also doesn't make sense. Part of the value of a stock derives from the fact that it can be resold. This will play into how much someone is willing to pay for the stock initially in the IPO, which does directly impact how much the company gets. Even ticket scalping is arguably useful to a company selling the initial tickets. Yes, it "drives up" the price of a ticket, but its unclear that that is a bad thing of itself. The main thing it does is guarantee that tickets will on average go to those that value them more. Arguably someone who was able to buy a ticket because it was scalped could gain more than was lost by the person who wasn't able to buy that ticket because it was scalped. Essentially, value is being added to the system, and therefore it does not follow that the scalper is receiving money for nothing.
in some cases you can get an additional increase in salary by taking a 401K because companies put additional money in so there is an increase in profit not only from investing but from just having the program and the company awards those who plan for the future. That additional money could be used for greater good later on in life, it isnt always going to be used for selfish motivations. Just some quick thoughts as I listen to this in the background.
People can’t seem to see that the top of debate was specifically 401k’s. Which essentially is the act of taking your hard earned money, giving it to global financiers to invest into global companies that uproot local businesses and traditions in towns across the world, while you are unable to touch that money until you are retirement age. Instead of you using that money to invest in your local communities.
You aren’t required to invest in “global companies” in a 401k. You can invest in company stock. If you work for a firm, I would hope you believe the firm is moral. Therefore, why shouldn’t you be allowed to invest in your company in defer taxes so uncle Sam gets less. Also, Let me know when you find a local community that is so moral that you can’t find any reasons not to invest in it.
When any company goes public it then has to answer to a board of directors and shareholders that demands profit. This leads to companies cutting corners over time. Sending jobs overseas, using foreign materials, lowering wages, etc. This is just more exaggerated in the top Fortune 500 companies. The point is that the only investments into communities have been through 401k investments etc into these companies that ruin the local communities. If people started keeping their money local, instead of sending it to global financiers, the communities would be better off.
So we should not promote globalization? We should avoid helping other communities outside our own? Even though other countries may be better at producing a good, we should disregard that specialization exists. Sounds great in theory but I’m not sure the outcome is as good as it sounds.
@@austinlinsky1574 you think your helping other communities by helping create monopolies? Foreign trade is one thing, having global monopolies and financiers control world affairs through economics is another.
I have a lot of problems with the definitions used in Jacob's opening statement. First and foremost is that the mere ownership of stock is speculative, which he then buttressed with the ticket scalper analogy. The scalper is only a pariah in that he artificially limits the supply of the tickets to then unfairly raise the prices later on...what if I sell my tickets to a 3rd party broker at a loss since I can no longer attend the event, and the broker then sells to someone else at a fair price, making a small profit in the margin. Is that broker still being "speculative" like the scalper? Would it really be better that I let my ticket go to waste, the broker not have employment, and the other party not attend the event? Jacob asserts that owning stock is speculative, uses a false analogy to illustrate the assertion, and then quote mines for the evils of speculation...seems pretty superficial and weak.
The 3rd party broker is not the same as the scalper. The difference is clear. A scalper buys out every ticket for a show that they can, to sell at an inflated price without adding any value. The 3rd party broker is acting as a service to resell only those unwanted tickets back to people at the correct price. For a real world scenario, imagine an opera house is putting on a show and contracts with ticketmaster to provide an online service to attract customers, sell to a wide online audience, promote the show through their advertising banners and email lists, etc. Ticketmaster is the 3rd party broker you are talking about, and somebody that can no longer attend can refund their ticket through ticketmaster and it will be made available at the proper price to another attendee. The scalper buys out the tickets sold on ticketmaster, providing no online platform or email blasts or contract with the venue, etc. They simple deprive everybody of the proper use of the tickets to enjoy a show to make a profit for no work.
@@zz-bq1yw I (think) I agree with your distinction between a scalper and a 3rd party broker and with your Ticketmaster example. My question in my original comment was rhetorical. Do you think I presented something incorrectly, or are we in agreement? Not looking to fight or quarrel, just seeing if I understand you and the example you gave correctly.
I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I'd dispute that scalping doesn't add any value. Scalping makes the tickets more available to those that value them more, some of whom would not have been able to purchase the ticket had it been bought out at the retail price (or "fair price", whatever that is).
For most people a 401K investment is a quick way to double your money when the company matches what you put into it therefore making it a vehicle to realize as much compensation for the value you are adding to your organization as possible.
I so want to have a drink with these guys! Jacob isn't wrong, per se, but I believe that he also isn't right about 401k plans. Neither is Trent wrong, but I believe he lost this debate. 401k plans are not accounts, properly speaking, but rather legal (read: "tax") arrangements applied to specific accounts. Within a 401k plan it is possible to buy and hold cash and/or commodities and/or precious metals and/or real estate and/or (most commonly and by an overwhelming margin) stocks and/or bonds. All of these different asset classes are available under 401k arrangements, de-jure if not de facto. To place the debate in Thomistic terms: this preponderance of outcome - "that 401k plans lead to an investment of assets primarily composed of stocks and bonds - is accidental, rather than essential to the nature of 401k plans. Technically, there is nothing immoral about participating in a "defined contribution plan" that a 401k essentially is, wherein the employer offers accounts with specific matching, vesting, and tax deferment options. One could then debate how assets are selected and managed, what constitutes "ownership" and "how 401ks make money" which, incidentally, is not always and everywhere through a "buy low and sell high" schema as Jacob claims. The bigger point is that one can, in fact, participate in a 401k without laboring under the pain of sin. 401k plans are not essentially immoral, as Jacob claims, though they may become so by virtue of a malformed or malicious implementation. That said: Jacob's vision and description of a better and more prosperous future that is neither enabled nor reflected in 401k participation rates is one that I find both appealing and persuasive.
Jacob does not claim 401k's are essentially immoral. He claims they are generally immoral and what that means. Rewatch his opening statement. He also mentions this numerous times.
@@justinlovern1902 I think Jacob is conflating the 401(k) with the underlying assets. Most of his criticisms directly apply to the mutual funds and ETFs that are most often held within 401(k) accounts. But 401(k) accounts often contain cash, bond, and REIT (real estate investment trusts) investment options as well: these being some types of holdings Jacob either doesn't attack or explicitly endorses (cash). The 401(k) is strictly that mechanism that allows an employer + employee to co-contribute to an employee-owned account with preferential tax treatment. Treating the 401(k) as essentially an investment in passive mutual funds/ETFs is a mischaracterization, even though I can agree it is generally true. Jacob and Trent are both brilliant thinkers and great debaters. I believe Jacob is wrong on this issue because even beyond what I said, the church does NOT teach that investments in mutual funds or ETFs are immoral: neither generally nor essentially. That is Jacob's central holding. He makes a strong, but not-prevailing, case, which mostly fails on 1) its conflation of the two issues - the mechanism and the underlying assets - and 2) by his over-generalization that ETFs and Mutual Funds are speculative in nature. Many such funds employ long-term "buy-and-hold" strategies that are not properly framed as "speculative". These long-term holdings pay out dividends (not the same as profits, sure) even as the shares increase in value over time. This may be technically speculative, but no more so than buying a house, gold, tools, land... and yes, even investments in small-business that Jacob endorses. Small business investments are, while local, and indeed more personal, generally and properly framed as high-risk/high-reward investments: read "speculative." At the very least, they satisfy his very own definition of speculative investing. Therefore Jacob hasn't eliminated the speculative nature of his investment: only localized and personalized it. That may be better. It may be good: conformed to the truth and beauty of the human experience. But it's no less speculative.
I also feel like Trent is specifically ignoring many of Jacob's points. Around 56:00 Trent says that Jacob's definition of speculation is "buying low and selling high". Jacob already clarified that isn't the definition he's using, and is actually using an economic authoritative definition of speculation in which there is no value added to involve price increases. Shortly after, Trent says that investing in 401(k) is justifiable because it helps companies to build capital. We already know from Jacob's opening statement that that is not true, as this form of investing is generally through mutual funds, not the purchasing of stock put on the market by the companies themselves. Little to none of the moneys invested in 401(k) actually go to the companies themselves. All of Trent's points have already been answered by Jacob, unfortunately I don't think Trent even realizes it.
One major issue I have with Jacob’s argument is that much of his objection is based on the de-personalized and indirect nature of these financial instruments. For example, investing in a 401k only produces indirect benefits for the companies invested in, and only benefits the current owners of the stock, not the company itself. But every publicly traded company is structured around this dynamic. The company is in fact measured by its stock performance. More indirectly, the market signals sent by such investing direct these companies. Your investment goes to someone who invested several degrees removed from the initial IPO investors - who themselves invested with the confidence that there would be a long line of investors after them. If we dismiss this all as too indirect, then we have to dismiss all other economic considerations that are similarly indirect. The famous Milton Friedman example of how nobody knows how to make a pencil comes to mind.
My impression is that Jacob would agree with your implication, and simply also look askance at those other processes. He's also unlikely to be cool with how stocks and public trading in general. Though he might also not care for the crazy levels it takes to manufacture pencils today. The difference with the pencil is that your action is simply buying the pencil, and so there is at least, from your end, a connection between your money and the actual product. in a 401k and other kinds of trading, the point is not to invest, properly understood as providing funds for the mutual good of the company to make and sell products, and you to take in a part in the profits/ risks, but to speculate on the state of the company.
@@maryangelica5319 I disagree with the proposition that the point is not to invest. It is exactly that, by providing a constant source of buyers for initial investors to rely on. There’s just a middle man between the funds and the company, in this case. Of course, he also posits that dividends are not the same as a share of profits, which is idiosyncratic, at best.
@@CMVBrielman it was my understanding that dividends were set in stone changing of course over the company’s decision. But not a guaranteed percentage of the profits. Which is what I believe he is pointing out. That it’s not a sharing of profits but more of another incentive to not sell. He would most definitely agree that our property should be the productive investment not our bank account.
@@andrewdoty2518 I’m not sure I understand your point - dividends are most definitely not set in stone. Companies move them up or down depending on their circumstances, with many choosing not to offer dividends (offering dividends is seen - wrongly, in my mind - an implicit admission that your company is done growing). Any profitable company chooses how much of that profit goes into dividends and how much is re-invested back into the company.
@@CMVBrielman sorry for the late response I’m not good at checking notifications, but I would change the wording of what you said that it’s not profits that they are particularly sharing although it is a part. Like if a company has an insanely good quarter of sales they often don’t share that profit with stock holders because they set the dividend for that quarter before hand. They can change it for the future but it would not effect how much the stock holder receives for that quarter. Lmk if I am wrong
I have read Cenesimus Annus and the Catechism on the relevant points and it is tragic that Imam has read into these texts something that is not there based on a definition that he got from a secular economist writing a text that is decades old and, most importantly, is not a source for Papal encyclicals. He is committing a classic example of eisogesis and, in doing so, is foisting his own scrupulosity onto unexpecting and sincere Catholics. This is tragic and Imam needs to take very seriously the account he will give for this on the last day as teachers are judged more severely. He also needs to be more circumspect in publicly speaking negatively about our Bishops. There is quite enough of that and the example of saints is to show reverence for the Apostolic Office even when those who hold that office are not worthy of it. One of the trends with heresy in theology is to be a rigorist. This was the error of Pelagius who held to very strict expectations about what was necessary for the moral life in order to be saved. Rigorism has been condemned by the Church and Imam is presenting a rigorist reading of Papal documents that rests entirely on a definition from someone who is not even a Catholic theologian. Again, this is tragic because it will harm souls. Imam is no doubt sincere (and likeable), but sincerity does not ensure orthodoxy. Nor does likeability. The quote given by Trent at the end of the debate was prophetic. Imam is putting onto people's backs burdens that the Church does not require. May God's grace grant him the humility to recognize that he has absolutely no reason to think that JPII was reading Samuelson and that his favoring this definition as the meaning to be read into a papal encyclical is purely arbitrary (with only the appearance of erudition by noting a couple of Latin phrases). I have answered why it is unjust to sell something for more than what it is inherently worth and to buy something for less than it is inherently worth elsewhere and I have also addressed why it is absurd to think that selling something at a profit (above the rate of inflation) is immoral. There are complexities to these questions that require familiarity not only with St. Augustine, St. Thomas, Leo XIII, and Pope St. John Paul II, but also require familiarity with language, definitions, exegetical principles, and economics. Imam has no expertise in economics and he has shown a complete lack of exegetical care in reading papal encyclicals by applying Samuelson's definition on them. He has chosen a difficult topic and has made subtle mistakes, but nonetheless has the boldness to present his "solutions" publicly when those solutions are novel (what Bishop or Pope has taught that investing in 401ks is immoral? No one. It requires the mistakes I have noted to arrive at that erroneous conclusion which is being read into Papal documents). My hope is that Imam will stop confusing people with errors and will work out these questions with theologians rather than disturbing God's people with subtle mistakes.
I am disappointed in Trent's poor use of appeal to authority fallacy in the debate. He appeals to specific bishop's opinions (not magisterial teachings) and says they are more authoritative than the saint's or whoever Jacob references. Then he goes further and appeals to specifics bishops practices and says if they do it, surely it is good. Jacob's reply to this illogical argument is to ask if the current bishops are known for being exceptionally holy and being amazing role models that we should follow. Trent then quotes Yoda saying that this is a dangerous thought to have. This is complete trash as an argument in light of the terrible scandals plaguing our bishops specifically in the USA which Trent uses as a guide (USCCB). According to this Argument of Trent's along with his "lack of a magisterial teaching specifically condemning a practice making said practice permissible", it makes any new sin not a sin until the magisterium gets around to defining it as such. (commented at 1:04:21 time stamp)
Similar to what another commenter said, I’m inspired by Brian but relieved by Trent. Money has always been something I been ambivalent or even fearful of because of the potential to corrupt (with too many non trivial examples in the world to be dismissed as worst case scenario thinking) but also has the capacity to do good
I think the major disconnect between the two is that Trent is arguing on behalf of what is textually legal, and defending those who in good faith make those investments, whereas Jacob is arguing based on Philosophy (or what SHOULD be condemned textually), and the overall impact on society. Jacob seems to to be always arguing based on taking small steps toward an ideal, even if those small steps are more difficult in the immediate.
Was contraception bad prior to Humanae Vitae? if so Then Trent's insistance that something be found by name in textual teaching falls flat to Jacob's point that if the underlying principles the Church has prohibit something then the thing itself is also prohibited.
What if they clear out their 401ks and invest in farmland? Then the stock market continues to decline and farmland continues to be stable or increase in value? Then they would be glad they took his advice.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 Yeah, because farmland is cheap... especially bidding against Blackrock. The stock market always bounces back, especially with inflation. Look at the last 100 years. There is a huge tax penalty for exiting your 401k, and people would probably lose out on an employer match. I understand the moral argument, but it is fiscally illogical.
@@24erstad You don't have to buy 10,000 acres. You can buy 40, that would sell for a lot less than the average college educated corporate employee has in their 401k. Look back at the last 100 years of farmland prices. At some point the US stock market will resemble Japan's (especially with the massive government debt we have).....large investment firms obviously bid up the price of equity's too, in fact a far larger portion of the value of stocks is owned by institutions than is farmland.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 right, but in that case they'd be buying something in order to seek a profit and it would also be wrong based on Jacobs criterian. So that wouldn't work either 👌🏻
Jacobs argument was too hard to follow. Even Trent had a hard time understanding his argument. Some investments lijr gold are ok if bought without the intent for it to go up in value, but because it retains it's value well against fiat? Makes no sense.
I don't know if Jacob is right about this, but what he's saying is that gold will buy you (roughly) the same amount of something (I'll use bread as an example) no matter the value of money. So if in 2000 you could buy a loaf for 1 dollar or 1 oz of gold, then in 2020 even if a loaf cost 100 dollars it would still be just 1 oz of gold. So even though the gold is now technically worth 100 dollars, the amount you can buy with it is the same so you haven't actually profited.
@@alexv7113 right, but in that case you would have bought it so that it went up in value against the fiat you hold, so it seemed like he was contradicting himself.
1:14:50 If Trent is going to put up self up to defend 401k's and stock market he should be able to explain what the stock market is and why companies go public. I get that he was making a point that companies act in their own self interest but specifics and details would have really helped the is conversation. Specifics about the motivations and benefits of a company going public, and why investors buy into this system would have given them both a lot more credibility.
I would say suggesting somebody own rental properties completely undercuts all of Jacob’s arguments. I’m only owning rental property to turn a profit, nothing more. Passive income. Which he claims is immoral.
I'm not sure that owning rental properties completely undercuts Jacob's arguments. I would argue that owners of rental properties are providing a service that has to be maintained when things break and wear out and they don't have use of their home when it is rented out. The owner is actually providing value for the rent money. Also, the owner has the risk that at some time in the future the price to sell the property could be less depending on the economy or other factors.
@@tylerjohnson9626 I wholly disagree. Why are you buying more homes than you need? Out of the goodness of your heart? Nobody does that. The whole point of a rental property is passive income and a return on your investment. I.e., it's an investment for the sole purpose of profit, which Jacob condemned repeatedly.
@@tylerjohnson9626 What? 401ks, if you don't maneuver, are 100% at risk at losing the capital or value/stock price in a mutual fund. Muitual funds just don't go up and up and up; they are very cyclic and demands that an employee be prudent by maneuvering noting most do not which makes the entire notion throughout the debate of buying low and selling high a total misnomer and a total mis perception of reality
Speculation is the only reason we have market crashes- I think this alone is reason enough to call all Christians to pull their money from speculative markets and to lobby for its abolition but at the very least decrease its effect on us and our communities as much as possible.
The difficulty in assessing this debate is that the Church was completely and utterly blindsided by modernity and philosophical/economic liberalism. It should have acted as quickly to develop a theology of the market as it did with a theology of sexuality. The fact that it did not probably has to do with how difficult it is to imagine economic alternatives, as well as the perceived need of Catholic states to economically modernize to compete with the Protestant states which invented the modern economy. New Polity and the American edition of Communio are developing that theology, among others. Another dynamic going on here is that Horn is quite comfortable and unreflectively comfortable in the current political paradigm, whereas Imam is a thinker trying to investigate alternatives. 1:41:36 1:41:36
Economic liberalism is not necessarily a uniquely protestant invention. This idea is popular but wrong. Catholic thinkers have been talking about thinking about economic manners for centuries, in particular the school of Salamanca in Spain.
Another point of Imam that is a mistake is the suggestion that no good is done by the money put in the 401ks. There are in fact two goods that come from putting money in 401ks. The first is the good of economic growth and the jobs that this provides. Without 401ks and other means of public investing, IPOs would never occur. When a company goes public (an Initial Public Offering), the capital raised through this allows for the company to grow and increases the amount of jobs that are available. After this IPO, what does Imam suggest? That those who bought the company are not allowed to sell it when they need the money for retirement? Well, that would undermine all capitalism which is something that is *not* in line with Church teaching. A second good that is done (besides providing jobs) is the good of allowing people to support themselves and their families when they can no longer work. So, yes, goods are accomplished through 401ks even if those who are not familiar with economics are not aware of those goods. Again, Imam needs to understand how all this works before making these arguments. The point Imam is making, if it were correct, would not just apply to 401ks. It would apply to capitalism in general. He is suggesting that I must produce something through my own labor in order to draw some financially beneficial use of a growth of my money. This is a pseudo-principle that undermines capitalism entirely. The pseudo-principle would appeal to Marx, but it is not the teaching of the Catholic Church. Greed is condemned by the Church, but capitalism is not.
As someone who has struggled with scrupulosity, including specifically about investment because of some of Jacob's arguments, I deeply appreciated Trent's closing statement. I respect Jacob for encouraging people to think carefully about their investments and to intentionally build Christian communities, but he goes too far when he insists that investing in 401k's (and in the stock market in general, though this debate didn't concern that) is immoral, and it's important to take note of the damage such views can cause.
The argument based on the supposed immorality of buying low and selling high would virtually shut down all commerce. That's literally the central premise of all retail business.
Retail businesses are selling *actual* goods which will be used. They buy low and sell high to cover the cost of acquiring the goods, staffing the store, and bringing otherwise unavailable goods to local customers. In Jacob's first example he explained that stocks are like buying a ticket to a game from a scalper, and you in turn scalp that same ticket for a higher price - but no one ever goes to the game. There is no exchange of any actual goods in a stock purchase.
@@cactoidjim1477 Weird, because I didn’t realize that when I buy a ticket from a scalper, I am acquiring part ownership of the team. That’s what he and you are missing. You’re not getting nothing when you buy a stock. You’re getting ownership of the company. It might not be a lot, but if you pull your ownership with other people of like mines, you can literally manage the company and change the way it operates. Sorry for any misspellings or bad grammar, as I am using Siri.
@@cactoidjim1477 perhaps you explain more, but isn’t that when you buy stock the idea is that the company will become more successful and you can sell for profit.
I have to listen to Jacobs whole argument but I’m not sure he made his case. I’m extremely skeptical of boomer economics but I still not convinced of Jacobs argument.
@@andrewdoty2518 perhaps you could help me out, what is he talking about stocks not having any association with their company. I’m no expert but one assumes companies sell stock in order to benefit themselves.
@@stcolreplover in the initial public offering they do, but after that on the secondary market the company themselves is not receiving you money. They go public to make a good quick sum of cash Edit: spelling. And clarify
@@stcolreplover no after that the people making the decisions (the board) on behalf of the company own large sums of this stock so they PERSONALLY profit if it goes up while the Corp itself sees very little (effectively none) of this money
I lost all interest in Trent as a debater after watching his debate against socialism and his debate for Feminism back to back. Seeing his lack of intellectual honesty and consistency really put me off his work in general
Now why is it immoral to obtain money even if the work is simple or even almost non existent? To me I can’t see how that’s immoral. Simply not working or not Doing much work isn’t immoral by itself and then getting paid for that should be alright if the work was down prior. Investing is always work no matter how little effort. People even spend years creating systems just for money. As the years pass they may spend no more years Doing work, yet they still get paid. I don’t see how that is evil because money isn’t evil, it’s how the money is used
I want to say Jacob but only for that fact that his views imply mountains of faith. You know dont even take a second cloak kind of faith or the birds dont store up food in a barn kinds of faith
Seems to me that Trent is leaning toward the end justifying the means whereas Jacob’s position is that the means of a 401(k) is itself is immoral, which I believe I agree with. Trent’s arguments seem to be because the 401(k) is the most common form of saving for retirement (which is a good) the means must be good as a result otherwise people could not save for retirement. I don’t see how investing or giving money essentially blind to people who only seek profit not the common good so that you can achieve a profit, even if you use such profits in a moral way can be good. Like Jacob says such a view is utilitarian and not Christian
Buying a company stock does not give that company money. It gives the person selling the stock money in exchange for a partial ownership of that company, thereby giving you a right to a percentage of that company's profits.
Jacob keeps asking how people saved for retirement before 401Ks. The most direct answer is that people tended to work for the same company their entire life, and those companies had defined-benefit pension plans, most of which no longer exist. Also, a 401K is just a particular tax-benefited way of investing in the stock market. People used to still save for retirement by investing in the stock market, it is just more of their money went to the government in the form of taxes, which can't possibly be a moral improvement.
Amen! As I said in my comments, one can contend that both the IRA and 401K came to be due to the inability of those companies to provide a pension since people were living longer and the notion that after all the baby boomers retire, social security is at risk also for the same reason!
Essentially Trent's point is that something isn't arguably immoral unless explicitly stated in the catechism. I find that incredibly hard to agree with. The catechism is bound by physical restraints, it can't hold all of the conceivably immoral actions humans can contrive, hence why the catechism is an ever growing document. The fact that we have debates like this is proof that we're willing to contemplate the morality of actions on a deeper level than that prescribed by the catechism (of course without denying church teaching). Trent basically just continues to contemplate on the morality of actions any farther than that discussed in the catechism, which he knows full well is a growing document.
Jacob continuously states that investing in 401k’s is done only to make a profit. This is not true. I invest in my 401k as a hedge against inflation. I don’t expect a huge profit from it, I only expect it to provide me with the same buying power in the future.
This is a good point. One could also want to invest in 401k to diversify one's financial assets. Putting all your eggs in one basket (gold) is very risky.
I think trents more nuanced view of the church's position is the correct one. Jacob's is arbitrary and wills poverty on everyone and cans be quite dangerous
He doesn't force poverty on anyone. Poverty also is not the worst thing in the world. The poorest people in the U.S. are still super rich compared to the truly materially poor around the world. Being smart with your finances is great, but idolizing them and wanting only profit is not.
Although 401k don't affect me I watched this to see if there's anything relevant to my thoughts about ETFs. TBH I think Imam has very poor understanding of investing, different vehicles and how much work and learning is required to actually invest even if doing it passively. I think he's confusing it with gambling. What I find bizarre is that Imam "knows" why most people are investigating, yet he can't tell why most people are playing lotteries when pressed by Trent, and refers to his own motives which are irrelevant. Best regards and thanks for hosting.
It was really disappointing to see Trent fall into the correlation-causation fallacy around the 37-38 min mark. The fact that the standard of living increased while stock market investing was ubiquitous does not imply that it happened because of stock market investing. That was really sloppy.
2 well spoken men debating over a subject I have no funds for nor am I interested in it. How about that this venue tackles the real ills surrounding us . eg . What can we do about the drugs destroying so many young lives or simpler things eg. the need to lie . Cheers
Jacob's assertion that the bishops don't teach on these things is false. Just yesterday, Bishop Paprocki gave an interview with the Pillar in which he discussed the moral imperative to buy from and invest in ethical companies. It seems clear from this debate though that Jacob's ideas are leading him closer and closer to dissenting from the magisterium. It would be one thing if he were promoting these views as an academic theologian who engaged with other academics in debate, but using a public platform to promote a highly speculative personal theological opinion to those without the academic training to properly evaluate them is extremely problematic (and in my view profoundly imprudent and immoral). Matt should stop having Jacob on and giving him the opportunity to unnecessarily burden people's consciences.
@@thebyzantinescotist7081 the quality of European PhDs aside, Jacob is still advocating for a position that is extremely speculative (he's the only person I've ever heard articulate it) and is at least prima facia at variance with the teaching of the Church (look, for example, at what the Compendium of the Church's social teaching says about modern financial instruments). It is imprudent to burden people's consciences with highly speculative ideas on a public platform like this. If he were an academic, writing in academic journals I wouldn't mind so much (I would still think his argument is silly though, since it seems to rely entirely on equivocation and ignorance of how stocks work).
@@thebyzantinescotist7081 That's honestly hilarious. Did he get a business degree first? Or did he work in a business? Or is he a do nothing that sits in an ivory tower living off a university endowment telling people what to do with their money that he has no idea how they earned it? And worst of all living off generations of saving and investments while telling you not to save and invest money.
It's good to hear Jacob out on this. It's good because he certainly offers good truths about vigilance on where our money goes, and using our money to build up God's Kingdom. However, misapplication of moral principles towards the stock market leads him to be incorrect on the immorality of 401ks.
Everyone here should go read the USCCB's guidelines for investing. I'm not surprised Trent Horn didn't bring this up since it seriously hinders his case.
Trent did bring this up. Principle 1 states “The Conference should exercise responsible financial stewardship over its economic resources. In practical fiscal terms, this means obtaining a reasonable rate of return on investments. A reasonable rate of return is considered one that matches the level of the market or at the least allows the Conference to meet its fiduciary responsibilities and maintain its mission. This requires prudence and caution in terms of the risks taken or not taken.” Principle 2 states “The Conference should exercise ethical and social stewardship in its investments. Socially responsible investment involves investment strategies based on Catholic moral principles. These strategies are based on the moral demands posed by the virtues of prudence and justice. They recognize the reality that socially beneficial activities and socially undesirable or even immoral activities are often inextricably linked in the products produced and the policies followed by individual corporations. Nevertheless, by prudently applying traditional Catholic moral teaching, and employing traditional principles on cooperation and toleration, as well as the duty to avoid scandal, the Conference can invest wisely and ethically.” If we apply this to individuals, even though the documents does not indicate that it should be, then we are left with something along the lines of: individuals should invest to meet their needs and should do so, when possible, in an ethical way. The challenge is that the individual may not have the same options as a large institution such as the USCCB. That said, many individuals increasingly do have this option as self directed brokerage options are becoming more prevalent and the range of ethical investment options are expanding.
@@Matt-el8tl I agree, if we have the ability to do so, we definitely should. I'm struggling to find a grave necessity that would push someone to invest in companies that pay people to violently rip apart and murder their children. This is what the conference says in regard to these types of companies: "For companies where it is discovered that there is some tangential connection to abortion, euthanasia, or assisted suicide related issues, the USCCB will engage companies through corporate dialogues, proxy voting, and support of shareholder resolutions to eliminate this connection." The vast majority of mutual/index funds involve companies that pay for child-murder travel benefits, as well as companies that produce contraception, use slave labor, etc, yet no one is buying into mutual and index funds for the purpose of changing the hundreds of companies that are in there, and they don't have the ability to either as far as I know. The purpose of these funds is to diversify your money to secure a profit down the road. Therefore, you should find funds that go along with the conference's guidelines, especially if we increasingly have the ability to do so like you mentioned.
@@grantbenson7458 That’s my entire point. Jacob wants to throw the baby out with the bath water, to invoke “The Benedict Option.” There is another route here. He could be telling people: - Look to see if you have a brokerage option within your 401k. - If you do, then use it and consider these type of companies / funds instead. - If you don’t, then send a letter to your company’s investment committee requesting that they add one. Bonus points for providing people a template letter that they can just print off, sign and send. This is the type of stuff that Catholic Vote does all the time. All in all, we can be in the world but not of the world. The suggestion that 401k are immoral is like suggesting we all move to desert.
Rather than assuming that the popes read the economist Samuelson, Imam needs to do the hard exegetical work of determining what a particular Pope means by the term in the relevant papal document. Just as it does in biblical studies, eisogesis of papal encyclicals does not help our understanding of Church teaching. It diminishes it. The key to the quotes given by Augustine and Aquinas is that it is wrong to sell something for more than it is inherently worth. The virtue of justice (giving to each what is due) is the key here. If someone were to buy something for less than it is worth and then sell the same thing for more than it is worth, this would be unjust. The key difference with buying and selling stocks is that the inherent value of companies ***increase*** over time based on their earnings (and based on inflation something that was not part of economics with St. Augustine and St. Thomas). If I buy Walmart in 1980 getting 30k worth of shares and the company balloons such that those same shares are worth 1 million dollars in 2010, I do nothing wrong by selling the stock in 2010 for what it is worth (making 970k in profits). As noted by Trent, if buying low when something is worth little and selling it after is appreciates is wrong, then it is wrong to buy and sell a house after it appreciates and it is wrong to buy and sell a privately owned business when it grows and appreciates (An investor is an owner of a publicly traded company). If the argument is that it must simply keep pace with inflation, this would entail that you never sell a product, like a house, when there is an asset bubble in the market you are selling it in (a real estate bubble). Or it would entail that you do the work to determine the fair value based on your own inflation calculations. I wonder Jacob, should they use the CPI or another measure for this? This only adds to the existing scrupulosity upon which Imam builds his teaching.
As a professional financial/wealth advisor, I try to conduct all aspect of my practice as a professional Christian especially the relationship aspect. I believe I have righteously assisted hundreds of retiree’s to sound decisions and I really work hard for my clients. Mutual funds is a great part of allocation and much research goes into hiring a qualified fund manager and understanding their philosophy and approach; not speculation if there’s technical and fundamental conclusions. Speculation is relying on luck and perceived opportunities - driven by biases. I only guide my clients to securities if they believe and somewhat understand the concept of silent ownership of a company and if I see signs of no interest in the reality of the idea, I present other options. To say mutual funds are speculation and leave it at that is to not understand the concept of hiring a professional manager to assist in buying companies, as I hire many other types of professional, e.g., Gardner and real estate agent.
Trent is putting on a masterful demolition of Jacob's case. I like Jacob a lot, but he goes too far and struggles with scrupulosity. Coming from a lawyer, Trent argued his case far better than Jacob did and used much more substantive proof where Jacob uses mostly his opinion.
Trent won the first half by a landslide. Jacob won the cross-exam by belligerently dominating the discussion but didn't win the argument. I'm surprised at how passive and rattled Trent was here. Anyone who feels Jacob won the overall debate is either a relative/friend, a professor who has never left the library (sound familiar?), as naive of an idealist as Jacob, or all three. Jacob argues about the subject like one who has never actually worked with or held a 401K but has merely read about them and yet feels qualified to speak authoritatively on them. And he conveniently urges Trent to stick to the premise of the debate when it works in his favor, yet refused to address secondary and tertiary arguments that are necessary to the primary. He jumps around and talks out both sides of this mouth on this one. In short, Jacob is a naive idealist who loves proposing controversial arguments from the safety of his New Polity bubble in downtown Steubenville. I would love to open up his bathroom cabinet and point out every example of hypocrisy he owns. EVERY time you purchase a product, you are not just paying for the good. You are directly investing in the manufacturing company and its future, whether you like it or not. Oh I forgot: "We're arguing about 401Ks here." How convenient Jacob. And he claims that working for profit alone is immoral yet fails to support his position because remember "we're only talking about 401Ks here." Apparently a worker making widgets who hates his job yet is only in it for the money, but is paying for his kids is moral. Yet if his profits are going to retirement he is living in sin. According to St. Jacob of course. His position was sloppy and unconvincing. The sad thing is that there MAY BE an argument to be made against 401Ks, yet Jacob is unqualified and ill-prepared to make that argument. Overall: Here's a novel idea--why not bring on debaters with at least an ounce of financial knowledge/expertise instead of these two who haven't shred of authority with which to speak on this subject? Trent wins this one, however, because at least he maintains some adherence to logic.
I understand most of us have 401k investments but Trent was beaten from a debate perspective here. Unnecessarily polemical, not clearly understanding Jacob's arguments
You don't see the irony in your comment? An ad hominem attacks the person rather than the argument, and your defense of Jacob is to defend his person rather than his argument, which is the reverse of ad hominem and called style over substance fallacy. Jacob is most certainly kind, articulate, and intelligent, but that doesn't make his argument correct. See the irony now?
I'm not sure if they were ad hominems, but he did frequently go ofter other things Jacob has claimed that were totally irrelevant to the debate. Bad form, in my opinion.
@@justinlovern1902 as I recall, Horn was referencing things that actually WERE relevant to the debate. Jacob seemed quick to retreat back to the debate premise on 401ks specifically even though his assertions on speculation and investment undergird his entire argument.
This was a great debate. Generally, I think Trent is correct in his cautions, but I think Jacob is correct in that Catholics need to much more conscious and conscientious investors. We need to worry as much (even more) about whether our investments are being used to build the kingdom of God, and of building authentic Catholic culture. I would love to see Jacob and New Polity provide more POSITIVE guidance on how Catholics can invest their money wisely and morally.
Yet another Catholic speaker placing undue burdens on the faithful to forward their own misunderstandings about doctrine. This is the new "woke" within the Church, that instead of being progressively, teach regressively; surfing through the Church Fathers and taking them as inspired sources to promote alleged more virtuous decisions and even to deter from so-called immoral practices. We classic apologists have to engage these people within our Church more often.
I commend Jacob for drawing attention St. Thomas' teaching in II-II q. 78 but I think he misunderstands what Aquinas is saying and how it applies to investing. It's critical to note that Aquinas thinks that investing in a business is perfectly moral: "On the other hand he that entrusts his money to a merchant or craftsman so as to form a kind of society, does not transfer the ownership of his money to them, for it remains his, so that at his risk the merchant speculates with it, or the craftsman uses it for his craft, and consequently he may lawfully demand as something belonging to him, part of the profits derived from his money" (II-II, q. 78, a. 2, ad. 5). Generally speaking, a 401k rises in value over time because the companies the investor owns shares in have grown more valuable by, for example, expanding into new markets or introducing new products. There are certainly ways to speculate in securities markets (eg., profiting from intraday price fluctuations, trading in derivatives, etc.), but these are generally not the kinds of activities a 401k investor is involved in. When it comes to investing in the stock market, Imam has it flipped - I think it's generally moral but can be immoral (or at least misguided or tending towards endless unmerited gain) in specific cases. These specific cases are widespread among institutional investors, to be sure, and are likely what Pope St. John Paul II had in mind when criticizing financial markets, but they do not concern the average person contributing to their 401k. Please correct me if I'm wrong!!
I think Jacob has some good points about the economy broadly, that the trend is less tangible work and more distractions for our eyes and bodies and the bloat of certain industries like banking and tech
Trent missed the mark on his opening statement, he should have spent more time emphasizing what it means for something to be generally immoral and how Catholics can know when something is: through the extraordinary magisterium or the ordinary and universal magisterium, unless something is made manifestly clear in scripture. Even with this gaffe, Trent was able to demonstrate from more authoritative teachings than Jacob provided that the church has not taught that it is generally immoral to invest in a 401(k), which left Jacob with arguments that might have been convincing for why one shouldn't invest in one, but that didn't prove the resolution that both sides were trying to argue for. This wasn't a good debate on the whole, and it felt like a waste of time to listen to either extremely low magisterial teachings on the topic of investing and reasons for/against investing being good. It should be clear from the lack of authoritative sources from Catholic teaching that it is not the case that it is generally immoral to invest in 401(k)'s, unless the church has been so deceived that it doesn't even recognize in a clear authoritative capacity that an activity that its faithful and clergy engage in as immoral, in which case you are in the wrong church.
Trent assumes that the vast majority of companies that are on the typical 401k provide for the common good. If the common good is protecting life and promoting peace then the typical modern company does not engage in that at all. Also Trent seems to believe that any typical modern innovation is always oriented toward the common good, but after reading the abolition of man I just have to disagree with that premise.
As a Catholic who thinks about Moral Investing for a living, it is tough to say who won this debate. I am leaning towards giving Jacob the edge here because the topic was 401K’s and they promote passive investing which to Jacob’s point is doing something solely for profit (I am sympathetic to the cause of providing for the future of your family, but not at the expense of funding the nefarious companies that are in almost all 401K products). However, I do not agree with Jacob that all stock market investing is immoral. If you were to invest in an individual company that promotes the common good (Say a Nuclear Energy Company or a Catholic publishing company), that does not participate in nefarious things like child labor, pornography, or abortion, and you are active in shareholder meetings then I do not see the moral issue from a commons sense perspective or from a Church Magisterium perspective. It seems to me that you are doing work in your research (lack of research is why 401K’s are morally wrong in my lay persons opinion) and putting forth time and energy, you would presumably want the company to grow not just to reap a financial profit but also so that the common good is increased. I believe Jacob’s rebuttal to this would just be to send the company money directly, but this is not prudent (which is a virtue) as a man is due his wage for his work and investing takes, if nothing else, brain power, which is work. I send money to a company, and it helps the company and promotes the common good, but I get nothing in return, this is of course not immoral, but it also ignores the fact that by buying stock in a company I can introduce a third good, namely the potential financial reward for myself and my family. If I have the option of doing something good for three people/causes/entities, why would I choose to do something that is only good for two people/causes/entities? Not to mention that by buying the stock of that company you have increased the volume at which that company is traded and therefore encouraged more of the market to back that company and this all allows that company to increase its reach and hiring ability which would promote the common good. Plus, you have a type of ownership now in the company and can make your voice heard. I have a major problem with Trent’s reasoning on using an iPhone being the same as investing in Apple. Purchasing a good/service does not carry the same moral weight that investing does because investing is always what you do with your excess. Now maybe you do not need that iPhone and you bought it with excess income but that is a conversation in of itself. Take this more clear-cut example; Amazon is a nefarious company (It funds abortion, supports Transgender Ideology, kills small businesses, and does a whole bunch of other illicit things) if you choose to invest in Amazon, you are only doing so because you want to get a nice ROI or you want to actively support nefarious things. However, if you are a single parent with young children who is going through a financial hardship and Amazon is the cheapest and easiest way to buy diapers, so you buy them from Amazon. Does buying the diapers carry the same moral culpability as investing in Amazon? I don’t think we need an official teaching from the church to tell us the answer to this question. Both debaters make great points, and both are great at what they do. I know Jacob personally and he always strikes me as someone after the heart of Christ, but like all people (Myself included) both debaters have some flaws in their thinking…I think. 401K’s are bad because they really don’t require any work on part of the owner, and they almost always have nefarious companies in their holdings. Stock Market investing I believe can be morally acceptable if research on a specific company is done by the individual, the company promotes the common good, the company does not engage in blatantly Christian opposed practices, and the investor is actively trying to make his voice heard within the company. Yes, we want to make a profit, but we also need to be concerned with common good and be active investors rather than passive investors.
Thank you for a wonderfully thought out comment, it has really helped. A question, if you don't mind: When you say investing is licit if you are actively trying to make your voice heard within the company (given the other moral conditions are met), it seems to me that would be virtually impossible to do within a publicly traded company (for a person of middle class wealth) because of the size of such a company and the separation you have from the boardroom. This would leave only small private companies, and local businesses as the only valid ways to invest. Do you find this to be the case?
@@BrazilianPride22041 I would say that private companies and local businesses are a more moral investment (if specified conditions are met) than investing in the market, but that does not make investing in the market immoral. I would draw attention to the fact that you are promoting the company to others by investing in it and ever so slightly increasing the volume. However, if you attempt to make your voice heard and you are met with slammed doors, it may be wise to seek out another company that is more receptive. However, in my personal experience (I hate using anecdotal evidence) most companies are pretty accommodating to all shareholders, it is just in their best interest. The thinking of a major company is that if this person who only owns two shares has this thought and is actually willing to express it, then most likely there are a lot more people who have the same thought.
@@ChristCenteredCapital Thanks for the response, very much worth considering. And I appreciate the evidence, however anecdotal, as I have zero experience calling up companies I hold shares in to voice concern.
@@BrazilianPride22041 Also, it is worth noting that voicing a concern or an idea to a company that is in alignment with your moral convictions is drastically different than getting your voice heard in a company that is staunchly opposed to your moral convictions. I may call company XYZ and say they should promote product X to a specific market, and they may listen to me or give me reasons as to why they have not done so. But if I call up company 123 who is opposed to my Christian Ethics and tell them to stop funding Planned Parenthood, I will most likely get met with no response at all unless I am a very "significant" shareholder. But it is always worth a shot.
Yeah, the idea of letting my money be funneled without knowing the exact moral stances of the people using it has always bothered me. Being direct and intentional, not passive, is the more intelligent way to invest your money. If there's a cause or company I believe in and we can help each other out, then I am all for it. People are used to not seeing the effects of their actions because everything is so disconnected and money is just numbers on a screen.
Not sure I'm following this opposition to "buy low sell high". Like, every company that produces something must do this to exist. The lumber yard must sell the wood at a price higher than what it cost them to buy the wood, otherwise there would be no gross profit to pay their employees.
The issue is that the selling high, in the case of the 401k, but also with speculation in general, is not due to any additional value the seller is putting into the product besides his money, but rather because he is trying to predict how much the product will be valued in the market independent of what he does to it. Buying some land or a home and developing it is one thing; you are actually working that land and making it more valuable for some function, so you should be compensated for that labor in addition to the value of the land when you sell it. But speculation involves buying and selling without any modification of the product, and making the decision solely based on how land is generally valued in the market. The lumber yard is likely putting some value into the wood (the labor it takes to get and prepare the wood).
@@maryangelica5319 Your example may work for very small companies that have no type of operating expenses, but for most there are many necessary people (and other overhead) in addition to this who aren't contributing directly to cost of goods sold. But pick any large company and my guess is they can't sustain on sales alone. There is generally some type of periodic capex, for example, that requires additional capital to be had (for companies large and small). We can dive into financial statements to investigate, as I'm just "speculating" to be honest ; ) The gain on investment is correlated to growth of the company invested in. It's not independent of the original investment, it's supported and enabled by the investment.
@@maryangelica5319 401Ks are a benefit to the employee due to the match. The match is provided by the employer to attract [higher matches] employees because of the work, talent and efforts the employee provides the employer on a daily basis
Time Stamp 1:40:00, I was really hoping Trent would better explain his poor use of appeal to authority, but rather than answer the question he dodges to saying to follow the authority of the magisterium. Trent did not reference magisterial teachings but rather the actual practices of specific bishops and then acts as if there are not many bishops supporting evils through their actions and/or words. Really disappointing. The media gas-lights us enough, we don't also need it from Catholic lay leaders.
This NEEDS a follow up discussion that goes in depth in the different sources. I think it was a mistake not to share sources beforehand. This way, the participants are in danger of quote-mining because noone knows the context of when St. Thomas or St. Augustine said "[10000 words...] it's bad to speculate [10000 words...]". I think St. Thomas actually allows a certain kind of speculation with the example of the coal tradesman. So actually the discussion is kind of worthless to the extent that you don't carve out the details. But it still was a great start and not worthless at all but establishing grounds for future debate hopefully. Because Trent is 100 % right that we cannot allow scrupulous people to mislead impressionable souls into throwing away their financial future (and maybe losing their Faith in the process). On the other hand, Jacob made some good points as well which if they weren't so extreme (accusing men of sin for following current financial wisdom which is NOT usurious and certainly allowed by Church officials as Trent pointed out) would actually merit discussion as well.
If your buying it in your 401k, which is the argument of the debate, you can’t touch that money until your at retirement age without taking on massive penalties and taxes.
@@coreychuba they’re saying “401k”but I don’t think they really were talking about the legal structure that allows pre-tax contributions. They probably should have said mutual or index funds which I think is what they were actually talking about. If I’m not mistaken you can invest in US dollars or municipal bonds in a 401k.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 correct or also in a money market fund/cash like a bank, but with the match makes your decision much more prudent to overcome inflation. You can also invest in REITS typically
I feel like neither side really clarified the idea of “solely for the sake of profit”. Other than a Scrooge McDuck type who gets some kind of greedy kick out of having more and more money for its own sake, no one works or invests only for the sake of profit. People seek money and profit as a means to something else weather it be necessities, charity, or pleasantries all of which can contribute to the common good. Jacob seems to miss this point and seemingly equates profit seeking whole cloth with unjustifiable greed. While I absolutely respect what Jacob is trying to do, Trent’s point about this discussion having a scrupulous or pharsaiacal character hits home for me. For transparency I am someone who both has a 401k and struggles with scrupulous tendencies.
Who do you think won and why?
Jacob. He adequately proved that 401ks are not generally moral investments. Goodness is not the absence of evil, but evil is the absence of good. Trent, though a true warrior and soldier for apologetics, rested criticisms on ad hominem. I appreciate the nature of debate, but it’s important to remember that underlying the debate is a conversation between two Churchmen on important matters.
Jesus
What, is this epic rap battles of history?
Trent was massacred
I thought Trent won convincingly. He pointed out the most important point that the church has in no way condemned this type of investing in any document or catechism. I felt like Jacob was making his own arguments citing obscure quotes from church fathers.
I worked at a Senior Center and it was a SAD place. I think that it is a good idea to invest in our kids. Kids in daycare are accustomed to not seeing their parents for long periods of time, divorce makes it even worse. Putting our aging parents in nursery home needs to be the last resort. I’m Hispanic so maybe it is acceptable in American culture. My grandparents had 9 kids and their children have looked after them. Some families even fight to care for their poor elderly parents. We live in a society that views the elderly, sick, disabled, and children as a burden. See it this way, you GET to care for your parents in a similar way that they cared for you.
It's an American thing and honestly a product of a culture that doesn't value life and treats people like trash at all stages of life, and particularly when they're unable to care for themselvez.
Agree it’s sad. Focusing on 401ks is an unproductive way of dealing with this solution. Being with (the ever increasing amount of) old people is way better.
Or seeking to buy local and live local to increase the # of generations living near each other
As a Filipino, it’s sad to see so many of my fellow Americans just shoving their parents in nursing homes. When I was a child we took my grandparents into our home. It was a big deal and it actually caused a rift between my parents and one of my aunts because my grandma wanted to live with us. I have problems with my parents but I could NEVER stick them in one of those care homes. I’ve seen how so many of them are treated. Many of these old folks haven’t seen their kids in years. So sad.
@@Jerds after the COVID nonsense, there's 0% chance I'll let my parents live in one of those things. Someone else said that 401(k)s don't help the problem but I'd disagree since family members aren't always equipped to handle their aged parents and they might help defray costs of things like an in-home nurse. Also, maybe it's just me, but if my kids have to live in a bigger house to take care of me, I want to help with some of those costs if I can.
@@Jerds an anecdote, my wife's grandmother was a prisoner in one of those homes during COVID. Couldn't leave her room. Couldn't see anyone. Just expected to sit there an be a vegetable. Poor woman died about a year and a half ago from, you guessed it, COVID. Despite all the best efforts they couldn't contain it in the homes and Dick Levine had the nerve to take his mother out of her nursing home right before he locked them down.
Thanks for hosting, this was a very good discussion.
I’ve really enjoyed New Polity’s work on this topic, but I do think the position that the 401k is immoral is quite a reach. IMO, Jacob’s message is much more potent when posed as a way to grow in virtue rather than to avoid sin/immortality. Trent hit on this in his closing argument. I’ve personally benefitted a lot from Jacob’s perspectives, but I fear that the immoral argument may harm others.
I personally didn’t enjoy the formality of the debate. It would have been more enjoyable if all three of you were in the same place enjoying a pint and having a natural conversation - this would have made the conversation more fraternal and charitable.
My fear is that someone will actually listen to Jacob and later find that decades of inflation has made their “cash savings” almost worthless.
He did not even acknowledge the problem of inflation, or how to hedge against it, as Trent pointed out that some people are so poor in retirement that they have to eat cat food. And buying gold as a retirement savings is absolutely insane, considering the price of gold is WILDLY volatile, which means it has not maintained its purchasing power at all times.
Jacob also did not address that yes, 401(k)s are relatively new; social security was created before that… but why?! Social Security was created before that because people were destitute in retirement! It was a safety net created in response to a problem that definitely existed.
I have no desire to bankrupt my kids when I retire because I took Jacob’s retirement investment advice.
@@definitelynotaheretic.7295 bro you are not retiring. Every 10-12 years the stock market goes into correction and people get a haircut on their 401k (which was never meant to be a sole retirement account. It was to supplement a pension), and often 401ks do well for buying the few stocks that go up high vs the vast majority that go up slowly. Our economy is so bad that the dollar will be worthless in 10 years, and with rumors of war between China and the US, you will not have anything in that 401k money trap.
I don’t know if either party mentioned this- 401ks have a clause where in times of emergency 401ks and retirement accounts pre-tax can be confiscated via a new law. Our debt to gdp is 120% currently- so how is congress going to pay off that debt?
@@frankleone7685 you are mistaken. Your statements about confiscation are not true.
As someone who watches a lot of political/social debates, I just want to take the time to appreciate how even at its most tense moments, just how civil a debate between two catholics is. I feel like I could genuinely enjoy hanging out with either of these guys.
Truly wonderful how faith can bring even people who disagree together.
Likewise, I'd have a lot of fun putting either of them on the hot seat. I love debating in person.
I think both did a great job! I think it is true that it is generally moral to invest in 401k, but from the standpoint of building the kingdom of God, Jacob Imam seems to be right. The difference between asking the question: "What are we allowed to do?" and "What is the most authentic Christian way to live?"
Well said
A cool perspective!
As the debate premise made clear, the question had to do with 401k investment as something "generally immoral." So Jacob was not arguing for the most virtuous or most ideal or most conducive to advancing a pious society or anything else other than affirming the premise of the debate: investing in 401ks is generally immoral (ie. it is against the moral law.)
I listened to the podcast version of this debate, but felt called to comment here. This was a fantastic debate on an issue I have been struggling with. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing both sides of the argument, and appreciated how Jacob and Trent were both respectful of their opponent's stance.
I think it shouldn't be respectful. He's going to be responsible for someone throwing away their savings while he still makes money preaching this destructive message.
One more thing is that differentiating between buying a stock in an IPO versus buying on the secondary market is a distinction without difference. The first would not exist without the latter. People invest in IPOs knowing they will be able to sell their shares later. Buying stock in a company materially helps that company grow and employ more people which build society.
That doesn’t mean that we should invest in an evil company just because they employ people, but it certainly does not make it generally immoral to invest in a 401(k)
Exactly. Jacob’s entire argument rests on that false premise.
Read Guido Hulsmann's "The Spiritual Effects of Fiat Inflation" as the antidote to boomer economics and as a critique of Imam. Fiat inflation is the problem, not speculation.
It seems like there is a large gray area with this conversation, but I think that the ideal is leaning more towards what Jacob has been saying. One side is building a town of large families and small businesses, and the other produces a town filled with global corporations fueled by everyone 401k’s that uproot local traditions/businesses and pay low wages.
I do think that is a key point. The argument is not what is better, but what is permitted. I don’t think you would get any argument from Trent that an investment in your community or with your family that you actively participate in would be better than investing in the stock market, but that doesn’t make investing in the stock market wrong in general
@@jerodfrank6419 that doesn’t make investing in the stock market wrong…but it might still be wrong.
Bingo
Was hoping to find a comment from someone that at least has a basic understanding of finance but I guess I'll have to make it. I urge everyone to completely ignore this debate as it is between two people that seem to lack even the basic understanding of finance. The purpose of owning stocks/funds in retirement is NOT to speculate i.e. buy low and sell high. It is to own stocks that generate income in the form of dividends (direct reoccurring payment of profits to a shareholder). This allows you to have a passive income (make money when you can no longer work). Unlike what was presented in this debate, being a shareholder actually makes you a shareholder in the company. This means that the natural end of a stock is to pay its shareholders in the form of a dividend. It is true that young companies do not pay dividends but investors are speculating on the future potential of the company to generate dividends! To be a share holder of a speculative Growth stock means you are in a sense like an owner, putting off current personal profits to receive future payment in the form of dividends. If you buy a substantial portion (even 0.1%) of a potential billion dollar company, this means that when they do pay dividends you will receive a hefty income. But you are also accepting the risk of being an owner of a company that could fail.
Now, each individual does not need to choose these stocks individually. A 401K typically purchases funds where it aggregates the risk of the individual stocks into a group. These funds/groups are normally broken down into risk profile. These risk profiles reflect the state of the company. Are they a young company that could fail to produce a dividend in the future? That is a high risk speculative Growth asset. Are they a well established company that pays a reliable dividend? Then they are a reliable source of income and are considered a Value asset. Making a group of stocks/fund that has diversity and reliability is the art of what these financial institutions do. What someone can do over the course of their lifetime is buy riskier Growth funds in their youth when they can afford more risk, then gradually transition to Value funds to provide income for your retirement.
Please don't let your blind hatred of things you cannot control (Jacob's view) or your lack of understanding (Trent's view) affect your financial future. It is hard for me to stress the fact that the financial sector actually does provide a valuable service that both men seem to lack an understanding of. The fact that both failed to understand even the most basic purpose of being a shareholder should be a red flag. St. Thomas would at least evaluate the teleology of being a shareholder before passing moral judgment on the whole idea. Unless the argument is that owning a company is intrinsically evil...
The future to a large extent is unwritten and risk assessment is real part of life.
Disclaimer, I am an engineer not a financial expert. I am merely presenting the basic information people should have about investing. Getting rich quick (greed) is a natural vice of man but it is not the purpose of investing in stocks.
👍
This reply gives me universal hope for the RUclips comment section writ large.
You are right in theory - what you describe is what stocks SHOULD be. However the vast majority of the activity on the stock market has to do with speculation, and dividends are rare.
@@romanslav827 Do you have evidence to support this claim? Like I said I am no expert but just a quick google search tells me that ~53% of stocks pay dividends. It seems the majority of stocks pay dividends. What metric are you using to evaluate relative volume of speculation compared to rarity of dividends? Sure, speculation gets the most media coverage. But this is equivalent to the lottery generating more excitement than the details of your local small business economy.
Even by this data, ~43% of stocks are speculative. I tried to make another key point to justify speculation on these assets. Which is sort of Trent's point of trying to nuance the definition of speculation but lacked the technical knowledge to do so. Speculation on these assets is contingent on future dividend payments/profits of the company. Jacob presents stock market speculation like a Ponzi scheme, where the asset's value is contingent only on relative amount of buying and selling of that asset. However, actual stocks (including speculative stocks) can be evaluated by the technical fundamentals of the company. Due to Federal Reserve behavior in recent years fundamentals have become partially decoupled from price (due to asset price inflation of their quantitative easing policy) and the overall market has become more speculative as a result. But the government can only make the market lie for so long. That is why with the current combination of inflation and recession the most speculative assets have been hurt the most (they were the most inflated).
Overall your point is very valid, but "what stocks SHOULD be" still exists. Personally, I stay away from these highly speculative stocks. But even these highly speculative stocks still provide some value and aren't solely Ponzi schemes. The stock market in this video is almost depicted like crypto/bitcoin (maybe because the media conflation of the two?). Crypto has no fundamental objective value, no tangible service to non-criminal behavior (primarily because the transaction price is non-competitive), and the price is purely set by speculation. Frankly, Jacob's arguments almost map perfectly to crypto and if he was talking about crypto I would be 100% onboard...
@@weingo939 I specifically just adjusted my 401(k) to buy more dividend generating stocks. So you can definitely adjust it for dividends instead of mere speculation. Overall I generally agree with you that discussing how stocks actually work would have benefitted the discussion. I personally had a similar objection to Jacob's opening statement where he was neglecting a huge part of what owning stock meant.
2 Corinthians 12:14 "...For children are not obligated to save up for their parents, but parents for their children."
If anybody who lands on Jacob's side of this could answer this I'd appreciate it: If working a job for, let's say Microsoft, is licit because the money I make from it goes to my basic necessities and those of my family right now, why is using a 401k to provide for my basic necessities in my old age immoral. Granted I think it would be superior to rely upon family and community first, but that wouldn't mean a 401k would therefore be wrong, just a less desirable choice.
And if a 401k is wrong intrinsically, what are the things I could do now to help provide for a future me (other than stashing money/gold/property under a mattress).
Because working at Microsoft is WORKING, while infesting in Microsoft though a 401k is speculating, and that was a major point of his argument. Jacob's critique was not so much about what you do with the money, but what the church has said about how it makes the money.
401(k)s are closer to gambling than ownership, as Trent concedes. Gambling is not intrinsically wrong, as Trent points out. Gambling becomes immoral when you risk your ability to provide for your own and others' basic necessities, as the Catechism teaches. So using a 401(k) for retirement is immoral.
Instead, use your money for:
1. True ownership of productive property, on which you work and from which you receive just reward. Examples include land, homes, businesses, animals, gardens, tools, and skills.
2. Buying friends through almsgiving, liberality, and magnificence, so that when that when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting dwellings.
To be clear he wasn't saying it's intrinsically wrong, but "generally", meaning it could be morally licit in cases of necessity. I believe he would say the same about the Microsoft job. If it was *necessary* for you to work at Microsoft, then despite their illicit behavior it would be okay (as long as you weren't directly participating in the illicit behavior) but if you had another better option you would be obligated to take that. Moving to the 401k I think he would say that if you're not already at the edge of retirement then you have ample opportunity to make preparations for your old age in more moral areas than the 401k and are therefore obligated to choose them instead.
As to the second part of your question, I would say that other than kids/gold/property the best thing is just becoming a cherished member of the community. If people find out the elderly guy they've known for years is about to become homeless, I doubt even non-Christians would be unwilling to offer significant assistance. (Sure you probably wouldn't have 5-star arrangements, but they'd almost certainly get you a roof, bed, and meals).
The conditions for condemned speculation are very narrow.
Keep
In mind that Leo XIII and other popes have promoted a doctrine of wages that does include opportunity to save.
Much of what is spoken about here on both sides does confirm that this topic is not outside a realm of prudential judgment. That is, the teaching on saving via 401k-like vehicles is not definitive, IMO.
An investment and an illicit speculative trade sometimes are hard to distinguish. A possible criteria was considered by Nell-Bruening, the notion that speculation does involve mental work. I think that is helpful but more to the point: secondary markets (yes, they don’t involve your handing money over for production of capital) serve a variety of social purposes that are good.
To add to the investment side of things:
Pope Leo XIII in his encylical Rerum Novarum, paragraphs 13 and 46 suggests that a father be thrifty and by cutting down expenses, attain productive property and pass it down through inheritance. This is considered natural and not inhertly evil. Productive property is vague, and you can take it many ways. You could pass on the tools of a business to your son, so he can run the family business while you take a back seat. You could also provide him a car so he can get to work, a house so he can have excess cash to provide for you or lower the burden on him to provide you one, or you could also go the full sustainable route and provide for all your direct expenses (self-sustainable farm, solar panels, well etc) so the burden on him is light. Those are far easier to control for moral culpability because you know your son better than (insert stock here). Whenever you physicaly work on something, you control its use. Financial instruments are also another legitimate way but your ability to enact moral control may be muddled. Stocks and Bonds offer a cut of the profits but just like any business, if you are profiting and taking a back seat to moral evils (abortion, contraception, nuclear weapons) or allow a slave-camp in your supply line (Apple with the Weiger(?) Muslims) you could be morally culpable for those profits that were attained immorally (in a distant sense but still exists). Even if you never received cash from the company, there is still an element of profiting from those types of evil. The way to counteract those evils is to fight against it via shareholder meetings and such and either voice your opinion (if it's a matter that is not intrinsically evil.) or divest (sell out). The issue with the 401k is that you are disincentive to divest because you take an income tax hit and a 10% penalty, which adds up to be less than you originally invested sometimes. Since 401ks also (mostly) only allow you to own shares of a mutual fund, not the companies directly, you do not get a seat at the shareholder meeting (unless you score big time and can incest in a Catholic fund that votes KoC and such). Most investment firms do not vote at all and take a permanent back seat. So 401ks disinvetivize your divestment and can nullify your ability to practice your required stewardship of the businesses you own (techniacalyy you own the stock, therfore you have a stake). If you just own a business or stock without the 401k tack-on, you can reasonably fulfill your duties, just do diligent research and stay up to date and informed. And with things more close to you (son's car, family business) you have a direct say in thier use, and the work required to fully understand the moral implications may be vastly less. If you give your son a car for the strict purpose of getting to and from work, and he plows 12 people over with it, you know you only gave it to him to go to work. With 401ks not so much. If you get a share of Apple, you have no managerial say as to how your money is used, they just get to use it for thier ends. Your only option is to propose a shareholder referendum (which usually requires a big minority stake) or just divest. Therfore is better to fulfill the direct need for productive investment as close as possible to yourself (since you can more easily direct the Catholic good from it) or if you need to go to the market (some people need to, no judge), invest in the companies directly so you can clearly steward your claim correctly by Catholic Social Teaching (divest and vote) and stay informed, up to date and ready to exercise the Catholic will on that company.
Edited for more clarity.
All Jacob does is beg the question. “You’re only investing to make a profit”
“Actually I want to use the money to do good”
“Well that’s utilitarian!!!!1 you can’t justify merely wanting to make a profit by wanting not merely to make a profit!!!”
What a joke
I think many would agree that Jacob/New Polity need to offer more practical guidance to back up their strong convictions.
AMEN
Agreed. Stop buying from big corporations and buy local or produce it yourself. Learn to maintain your house and your car. Build real community with your parish where people are giving to each other. Get out of big cities. Have a big family.
Using Jacobs example about lumber speculation shows his misunderstanding of market fundamentals (not that Trent did a good job of rebutting him). First- labor (that is non-evil), to seek a profit is not wrong. I understand that ONLY seeking a profit may be wrong but I am not sure about that as I am not moral theologian, however that is not what is happening in the case stated above. Both profit and a value-add is occurring. Obviously the main driver is to seek a profit. But that is the case with all work. Most people go to work to make money & yes they are also contributing to the common good but that is rarely the driving factor both now and in history. When markets "speculate" they are doing a very laborious scientific inquiry about the price of future goods. What drives the price of the current and future price is supply and demand which is driven by scarcity. So when an analyst "speculates" about lumber he see's that lumber is plentiful and therefore cheaper today but because of his research and inquiry (which is labor) he expects scarcity in the future. So what the analyst does is take and buy the "plenty" and stores it (which is also labor and has cost). Now because of the research and inquiry the analyst did, he predicts that for whatever reason there will be scarcity in the future of lumber. When that occurs the analyst provides a service and product of providing what he or she obtained during the plenty out on the market to satisfy the scarcity. Now he makes a profit for doing this as anyone who works seeks to do. But what the analyst who speculated was doing is providing to the common good when there is scarcity. Now he makes a profit for this but that is because of his labor, intellect and opportunity cost and sacrifice he made by not spending the money else where. Almost always the only reason for price change is scarcity.
These guys also don't understand net present value. No one buys and sells stock without expecting a dividend at some point. Google trades 20x its earning because investors bring to the present value future cash flows paid out in the form of dividends. Apple has never paid a dividend but it will in the future. How much will it pay out? Exactly 152 dollars per share in the net present value. (which is the current share price).
@@danielballabani1232 You are simply bolstering the case against speculation.
Sophisticated programmers may employ their skills to craft ransomware programs that will encrypt all the computers of businesses, banks, government offices, or personal computers and charge a fee to unlock the data. Or perhaps they simply sell their software to bad actors. Maybe those bad actors spend a lot of their money of these programs instead of other things that would give them less money and spend a lot of their time sending phishing emails. Either of these are doing "work" and using skills, intellect, time, effort, and everything the speculator is doing. But all of these people are doing illicit work that harms others and benefits nobody, adding no value to help others.
At every point in your scenario, the lumber speculator harms others and only profits personally. While buying excess in the surplus, he increases the demand artificially himself, preventing others from buying at an even lower surplus price. When selling during the period of scarcity, he deprives others of the fair value of the lumber goods they are trying to sell who did not hoard excess lumber in a warehouse.
Imagine instead that the speculator used his knowledge of fluctuations in lumber supply and demand to purchase excess wood to build extra furniture in his carpentry business, or invest in a carpenter friend to help buy extra wood to made extra furniture over a period of surplus. Then, when lumber prices are high, they have spent this whole time adding value through their skills to sell cheaper furniture at a lower price than it would have been if they had to buy all that lumber from a speculator. This is the type of investing and value adding, people can actually use furniture to eat off of instead of the floor, or prepare food on their wood countertops. Or maybe ASP or HfH can afford to build cheap homes for the poor to live in or repair their leaking roof.
In your example he is speculating on the future price of furniture by selling it during a wood shortage, which will cause a furniture shortage and drive up the price, which you praise him for lowering.
Also, is it good or bad to bring extra supply in during a shortage? When he brings over surplus furniture you bemoan his effects on the high lumber price, yet praise it when dine with furniture.
It would have been nice if the debate would have been on the broader question can I invest in mutual funds or ETFs? Trent seemed to recognize this is the broader question. Jacob wanted to throw out anything related to the broader question pre 401k.
I liked the debate and although Jacob gave me things to think about, I remembered the parable of the talents. Two of the three invested the talents given them in order to increase (obtain profit) and return that to their master... who commended them and rewarded them.
Another parable of an owner who put everything into "planning for his future" and he died without benefitting from hus investment. This parable illustrates the need for prudence and not being selfish. The owner should have helped the poor and put away a certain amount for the future... being one example of prudence.
Thank you Matt for another thoughtful debate!
Good point, although I would point out that Jacob was not opposed to investments. It's important to remember that investing in general and investing in the stock market are very different things (although in the modern day it's become synonymous). Nothing like the stock market (or 401k's) existed in the time of Christ, so in the parable of the talents the investments that the servants had made would have been directly to businesses (likely local and small) that they supported. In a literal reading the parable actually speaks against fearful saving, which is in many ways what a 401k is.
@@alexv7113
I would say to a point maybe.
The point Jacob was making about 401K's was they are just for profit and that's what made them bad. My point about the talents was they were used and invested to make an ROI which is what was praised snd rewarded by their master. The one who didn't try to get a profitable return was rebuked.
The other parable could be comparable to a 401K only if someone put all their resources into it (or any other investment) without giving to God, giving to the poor and/or their family at some capacity before investing some into their future.
That's just my take though. Definitely not magisterial. lol
@@RGtr1 Oh, my bad I misunderstood. I still wouldn't say the servants were profit-seeking necessarily, but I guess that's a matter of interpretation.
The first parable was about growth based on work and the results were not for himself. In addition, the parable is instructing on stewardship, work, and accountability rather than what is an ethical investment. In the second parable, as Christians our future is heaven so unless he went to hell it is hard to conclude that he did not benefit but certainly your point of helping the poor is a great one. Most of the time focusing on yourself could mean focusing on nothing but focusing on others may be focus will bring focus on you. Great parables though
Amen! As I mentioned in my comments very surprised as well that Trent did not reference this parable, especially when juxtaposed to inflation nowadays
If something as common and deeply linked to peoples' ability to support themselves (ESPECIALLY the elderly and sick) as 401K's were generally immoral (because of speculation) and the Church did not teach this in a clear way through its proper means and channels, we would have an even larger issue than the dissent we have among the issues that ARE clear. There's no obligation on the part of the laity to apply moral principles the way Jacob is doing here, in fact it's probably dangerous.
This would also need to extend to pensions, as pension contributions are often invested for return by the companies/governments that pay them out. Imam's idea of saving via "cash gold and real estate" would leave one worse off financially and also potentially worse off morally - speculating with REAL ESTATE potentially deprives a young family of an affordable home!
My mom did not save for retirement at all, and my only sibling is not doing well financially, so it is up to me to financially support her while I also try to start a family of my own. It's not an easy situation to be in. I don't think saving to avoid a similar burden on my own kids, or maybe even being able to help them, is immoral.
It’s so so important we continue to talk things out!!
CFA charterholder here. Imam fundamentally misunderstands the stock market. For one: the stock is a share of ownership in the company that you can exercise - not simply a ticket. Two, the stock market's purpose is to give liquidity to shareholders, distribute ownership of corporations, and raise capital. The latter of these is what Imam would be more interested in. The fluctuations in the price of shares gives companies better terms when raising additional capital for expanding their services and increasing their cash flows.
I would ask Imam this: is it immoral to buy out someone else's ownership in a private company? If the answer is no, long term investments in the stock market is not immoral.
@@hacker4chn841 this needs to be pinned.
Imam doesn’t know or understand the fundamentals.
I really think Jacob’s definition of speculation and his early criticisms only apply to day trading and arbitrage seeking, not long term investing.
Speculation is a kind of investing, not synonymous with investing
Coming from a Catholic financial advisor
Agreed. His definitions were not nuanced and blurred too many distinctions. Following Jacob's logic, it would seem to lead to the conclusion that all public ownership of companies is wrong.
@@phoult37 or passive private ownership
@@jerodfrank6419 Yes indeed, even providing seed money for a startup would be illicit in his view. I also found his critique to be very American, in the sense that he, rightly, sees some of the pitfalls of American Capitalistic consumerism and castigates the entire Capitalistic system overall. Sure, we don't all need iPhones, but he can also see the benefit in childhood mortality decreasing?
He has a basic misunderstanding of stocks.
@@phoult37 I suggest you rewatch or watch the whole thing. You did not follow his argument.
Thanks Matt for connecting these two on this subject. I knew they had two entirely different views when I initially heard jacob speak on this subject on your channel right after I heard Trent affirming retirement investments on his channel.
Gotta say man, the parable of the talents really does not support the 401(k) route as all, seeing as Jesus was specifically meaning that parable as a discussion of building God's kingdom (using the king's money to make the king more money), not using the king's money to make ourselves more money.
My takeaway: I'm more inspired by Jacob here, but more relieved by Trent. And for me that's interesting to reflect on. It feels like Jacob is calling us higher, which I _want_ as a Christian. At the same time, I'm working my way out of debt and my workplace provides this kind of investment-matching for me (which I do use). Guess where that leaves me right now is not moving my actions yet (as Trent points out the magisterium seems not to _require_ this, and in my circumstances I feel there's serious reason for being careful), but I want to hear more from people like Jacob. I _want_ to hear a robust plan for an alternative Christian economic model that I can participate in; I want to be called higher and just know that whatever I do is consistent with the goodness God calls us to.
My question is if 401K's are immoral, then should people be working for companies that provide 401K's? By association aren't those companies immoral? This sounds like an argument made by someone who has the luxury of deciding how to invest (moral or otherwise) because they make a good income. "I know several people who retired with nothing but cash savings". So do I, but that is the exception, and they were making a ton of money to be able to do it as well. Somebody who's making poverty level income, yeah right......
Jacob addressed the first part of your question in the debate. Working a job provides for your primary needs, so while that job is the only feasible option for providing for your family it is perfectly licit to work it. Jacob's problem with the 401k itself if that you invest in it using your excess funds, not the primary funds you need to stay alive.
@@BrazilianPride22041 Work somewhere else. Can't have it both ways, IMO. Seems to be a sliding morality scale going on there by someone who doesn't have to worry about money (Jacob). I've seen the utter devastation wrought by not having enough to care for yourself when you can no longer work first hand, both to the individual and their family. If we're going to allow exceptions, that situation is a greater morality issue in my opinion, than investing in a mutual fund.
@@Bloozestringer If you can work somewhere else, you should. Did you not read that I wrote 'The only feasible option'? Most who have significant excess funds enough to be investing in a 401k are not living in destitution, and likely will not in the future. You're making a utilitarian argument about allowing a small evil in order that good may come of it. Address specifically the morality of the act of investing in a 401k, that's what the debate was about. I will grant you that Jacob's case is made significantly easier if he provides feasible structured steps to care for ourselves in old age, other than 'return to family and community' which is easier said than done.
So if I were in Kansas City, I could not work for the archdiocese because it offers 401Ks to its employees?
@@TheNYsoxfan, only you and the Lord know if it is the only feasible option for you to work in order to provide for you and your family right now. I couldn't make that specific judgment for you. If one answers the question in good faith and trust I don't think it'll impair one's relationship with God.
There are more fundamental economic and moral presuppositions both debaters are assuming that must be resolved first.
What is work? Is a certain level of work required to generate value?
What is value? How is it determined? When are value levels moral or immoral (this gets into usury because interest rates are just prices which are measurements of perceived value)?
These are just a few examples. I think we need a 3-4 hour dialogue.
Exactly. These are economic arguments, not primarily theological/moral.
Bingo.
Yes, those would have been useful things to clear up. What we really need is someone like you to moderate it and ask these probing questions. Matt Frad is great, but he is a very laid-back moderator, and doesn't really have the background to know what questions to ask and when it is necessary to insist that the debaters clearly define their terminology.
No horse in the race here. Don't even think that 401ks are a thing in this part of the world, at least not a major one (and certainly not with that name...) but it did seem that Jacob went into this one very surgically and Trent was more broad with his use and explanations of some terminology embellished with great rhetoric and technicalities.
For me investing was always something you do because you believe in someone or in their idea/work, and you do it seeking their good as well as seeing that the good of their work is also generally benefitial. I don't know why one would attach pursuing a profit onto such action? I gave money to people/causes so I could help them to good. Seeing their good work being aided in that way was more than enough for me, since I didn't spend so much that it would endanger the needs of my family and I felt called to invest into things greather or somewhat other than my own work. Again, I don't know if doing that while having an idea of monetary profit from it, is a good thing. It just seems like good ol' greed.
Don't know who won. Would be very interested in hearing Matt unpack this one. I agree with Trent in a "poetic" sense that , no, you're not an archdemon if you invested this way and that good can come from it in some cases. At the same time, I get a strong "Guys, we christians should know better" sense from Jacob that I do very much like.
I'm not so concerned with who won, but Jacob's definitely correct. The only real counter-argument Trent makes is that Jacob has the "burden of proof." I'm not sure what Trent would consider "proof" of something being immoral, but he seems to suggest that unless and until the Magisterium explicitly says so, nothing can be known to be evil. The silliness of that argument should be obvious. If we are endowed with a conscience which is informed by grace, we are capable as Christians of realizing something is wrong - whether or not the Magisterium happens to have said so.
The stated purpose of the Magisterium is to interpret and preserve the truths of the faith transmitted through Scripture and Tradition. The idea, then, that the Magisterium must figure out every possible evil in the world and forbid it before all of us conscienceless Christians partake is a very weak one.
Finally, there are countless examples of evils recognized by the Magisterium AS A RESULT OF Christian scholars like Jacob making that case. So, again, the notion that we cannot or should not trust any Christian's case for something being wrong before the Magisterium declares it is foolish. Jacob provides many excellent points which Trent fails to refute.
I've never seen Trent so outmatched in a debate. Not coincidentally, it is likely rooted in a very American attachment to markets and wealth. Church teaching is clear our economy is unjust, and Jacob made that beautifully clear.
I respect Jacobs case made and am sympathetic, but this way of thinking is the same as what leads to scrupulosity and rad-tradism.
I think a lot of people have been looking forward to a debate on this topic, so I was really hyped when I saw it scheduled! I lean heavily towards Jacob's position of more radically living out our faith, but I have to admit Trent is the better debater and mostly carried the day. Trent's gambling analogy, and argument from lack of specific magisterial prohibition, quite convincingly defeat the thesis that to seek profit alone is intrinsically immoral (although I'm not sure this is exactly what Jacob means, or if that proposition even makes sense).
The compromise position that I think Jacob should have argued for is that investment can be spiritually dangerous or harmful, not that it is "generally immoral" - a term he equivocates on (e.g. attacking Trent for consequentialist reasoning when he describes the good that can come from it, which is invalid reasoning if the act in question is intrinsically immoral, *but* Jacob's definition of "generally immoral" seems to preclude that). He builds a pretty strong case regarding how it can easily lead one away from virtue and encourages the proliferation of structures of sin, however, and how we need to spend our money positively building up the City of God instead of accepting the structures of the City of Man
A few other comments:
- Jacob's quote from St Thomas on solicitude is actually a reference to Q47, Art. 10 in the Summa, on whether prudence applies to the governing of many. The word "solicitude" doesn't appear in the New Advent translation, so that might be a bit confusing
- Jacob should have hit back on the example of the Bishop exerting his ownership in Walgreens by saying that that's not what people generally do with their investments, that investments are generally for the purpose of making money alone, and that that case would be moral. I feel that red herring wasted quite a bit of time and obscured his actual point
- Trent is wrong on the issue of usury: usury is the charging of *any* interest on a *personally-secured* loan, where the lender can pursue the borrower personally for the capital lent, regardless of anything that happens to the borrower. This is in contrast to a non-recourse loan secured only by some specific property. Credit cards and student loans, then, are instances of usury by banks against individuals - but interest on a bond or deposit, which is secured only by the assets of the company or bank, are not. This is clearly and explicitly taught in multiple Papal bulls, but de-emphasised today. Read Zippy Catholic's usury FAQ for details and rationales.
- On that note, I think what Jacob was going at is the neglect/reluctance of many prelates to speak on difficult topics of sexual morality, not that the bishops can just be ignored. The point is, the recent reluctance of the magisterium to emphasise certain points should not be taken as a rejection of those points. Trent counters this ably though, by pointing out that the magisterium has never taught specifically that investment in the stock market is forbidden, and that the evidence weighs against Jacob's definition of speculation
Trent's gambling analogy, and argument from lack of specific magisterial prohibition, quite convincingly defeat the thesis that to seek profit alone is intrinsically immoral (although I'm not sure this is exactly what Jacob means, or if that proposition even makes sense).
Yeah, was wondering what he meant by that too. Technically as Catholics, we should be detached from all things that are not God, and should only use things insofar as they pertain to our final end. However, this does not imply that we should not seek lesser goals in our efforts to seek that final end. Ie: there is nothing immoral about training for a few hours a week to become a fantastic soccer player. It should be ordered to higher ends (ie: physical fitness in order to have more energy to achieve other things, also just the fact that recreation is healthy psychologically), but in the moment of the game, it's perfectly fine for a competitive person to be completely fixated on scoring as many goals as possible.
Of course, this must be done within the confines of the game - no fouls, cheating, etc - which is analogous to morality is the capitalist marketplace. So, in the sense that we should always be oriented in some way to our final end, sure. But there is nothing wrong with seeking lesser goals in the meantime which do not conflict with that. "Profit for profit alone" almost seems like semantics. What someone uses their profits for cannot be ascertained from how they achieved them. The fact that I made profits on the stock market, a personal business, speculation, etc, tells you absolutely nothing about whether I will use them for good or bad. So, to imply that speculation seems to fail right at the definitional level.
There also is a valid economic critic I think about the idea that speculation inherently adds nothing. Speculation is similar to insurance in that it prices in risks and uncertainties. Information has real, economic value. Assuming the speculator takes the full brunt of his possible failure (ie: no capitalized gain and socialized losses), then there is real value added to society by the presence of speculation. Iman didn't even acknowledge the existence of this argument, but simply assumed that speculation was a zero-sum game.
(This is different from the question of whether it's parasitical in practice as there are substantial distortions in the financial markets which detach normal price signals from reality. Unfortunately in our current environment there is also the moral hazard problem where it is possible to game the system in your favor by bribing/"lobbying" the right officials).
Unfortunately, this discussion needed a lot more nuance and rigour than it was given.
I do have to disagree with Trent regarding gold. Jacob is correct. We have a fiat currency so that means the dollar changes value, not necessarily gold. People buy gold because whether or not the government ruins our currency by over printing and inflation, they can still exchange gold at that particular moment to keep the same value and buy the same goods. Investing in gold is more of an assurance of purchasing power and protecting against people ruining your personal wealth
Gold still fluctuates even when purchasing power remains constant.
Yes, since gold still isn't used as money universally in the modern era, its real value does fluctuate beyond is merely inflation adjusting movement. Even when gold WAS used as money universally, its real value still moved since the supply of goods, services, and population usually increased at a faster rate than the supply of useable gold. This is "built in" price deflation, meaning the gold will be increasing in value relative to really things. In fact, over short periods of time, this can even happen with paper currencies like the dollar when they rise against other currencies on foreign exchange markets because of tightening monetary conditions in which banks stop making loans, effectively sucking money back out of the economy. I doubt Jacob would say that we can therefore not use money at all. Or would he? After all, whenever you buy something with dollars, you are selling the dollars themselves in exchange for goods or services, and whenever you sell something you only do so by buying dollars. If the money goes up in value that is capital gain in real terms, I am very concerned with the logical ramifications of mr. imam's view. I fear they would in practice inevitably lead to the ruin of civilization.
Gold has much more volitility than the dollar. One reason for this is that the dollar is only a means of exchange and gold is an industrial and use commodity.
Buying stocks (or putting money into a 401k) does NOT equate to speculation. It means buying a percentage of a company in exchange for the right to a percentage of that company's profits.
It is not necessarily even about buying low and selling high. For example, even if you knew that a particular stock would stay flat in value for many years to come, you might still invest in that company for the sake of receiving dividends from its profits.
Buying a stock is mutually beneficial for both the buyer and seller. The buyer gets the benefit of a percentage of the company and the seller gets the benefit of cash which might be needed for other good pursuits.
Also, while it is true that when you buy a stock you theoretically raise its value (due to increasing scarcity) it's also true that when you sell it one day, you will also decrease its price for the next buyer to benefit from company ownership. So buying stocks is not simply a matter of artificially pumping up fake wealth.
Please do not empty your 401k. None of the Church fathers said anything about 401ks. This is nothing more than a theological opinion.
401k is an invention of modern capitalist madness.
Trent praises our secular gains that come from investing. Jacob bemoans our spiritual decay that comes from investing. What does it benefit a man to gain the world if he loses his soul. Trent defends what limits of one should be able to without completely falling out of the Church. Jacob calls us to a higher way of living so that we can better love our neighbor and live the Kingdom of God.
I disagree with your implication. The debate was to address a very particular point about the liceity of a particular action, not whether it is the best action. More generally it was a question about an aspect of truth. Is A the case, or is it not the case? Having a good understanding of the truth is foundational to being able to make moral judgements about the best way to act in light of that truth. Narrowing your attention to focus on a particular topic of truth does not imply that you are neglecting all other forms of virtue.
If Jacob's true intention in this debate was to do what you say, that's great, but it wasn't supposed to be the topic of debate. And therefore only served to confuse the issue.
People aren't ready for Jacob's more radical view of money (I'm not sure I am either)...but I think he proposes the higher way and one that Jesus would ascribe most closely to.
I'm not sure who I would say "won" the debate, but what I am sure of is that out of everyone I've ever known/know of, Jacob most clearly embodies the peace and joy in Christ that I most desire to have in my life. Accordingly, I'm inclined towards his argument on the topic, which of course stems from his unflappable trust in the Lord.
Be careful with that line of logic. Even Jesus says that the children of the light are not as prudent as the children of this world. Therefore Jacob's peace or innocence is still be compatible with ignorance or naivete.
In minute 38, Trent made Jacob look like a hypocrite. But even if Jacob is a “hypocrite” by using these technologies himself, does not mean that his argument against 401K is wrong.
The hypocrisy does harm the argument: the teacher that doesn’t live the doctrine doesn’t believe in it.
@@michaelwelker8759 Do as they say, not as they do.
It gave Jacob a chance to clarify a distinction, if such a distinction existed (I wouldn't' think it does). That fact that Jacob dismissed the question as not relevent implies either dishonesty or that he didn't understand the point. In charity I'd assume the latter, which would in fact, harm his argument.
No offense to Jacob, but this debate was over after Trent's opening statement.
Trent did have a strong opening statement, and may even be right that investing is not generally immoral, but I think Jacob's perspective is ideal.
@@willing_spirit6830 Yes, if they were debating what is ideal, I agree.
@@willing_spirit6830 Ideally, we wouldn't live in a complex economy with rampant inflation and devalued fiat currency. Ideally, people could just save their earnings without getting punished by this insidious invisible tax.
@@24erstad True, ideally we would have a good and righteous king on earth to which every knee would bow. It may be unreasonable to pretend living by such ideals is possible before the 2nd coming...
@@willing_spirit6830 Yes, idealistic, but not reality, as 401Ks have nothing to do with speculation or employees buying low and selling high, doesn't happen within the 401K construct
Jacob did a great job of explaining why 401ks are bad.
Trent did a good job of explaining why many people feel it's necessary to use them and that the catholic magisterium doesn't prohibit it.
I'm still not sure whether it's moral or not though. Jacob made a great point about how asking "Where's the line? What are the exact rules I can't break?" is not the mind of Christ which we should strive to have. This is one of the biggest themes Paul develops throughout Romans. On the other hand though, it is a good thing to manage our finances wisely in this corrupt world in order to provide for our families.
Was contraception bad prior to Humanae Vitae? if so Then Trent's insistance that something be found by name in teaching falls falt to Jacob's point that if the underlying principles the Church has prohibit something then the thing itself is also prohibited.
I'm not sure Jacob did do that. I didn't find his premise that economic speculation provides no useful societal benefit convincing. Without it, his whole "profit alone" point doesn't hold water. Speculation in theory is useful because it helps to price in risk. Something like stock price (as well as commodities like lumber, and other assets like real estate) is inherently uncertain in the future. Speculation puts a present day price on future things, and therefore adds an element of certainty to society/the economy. It's very similar to insurance, from an economic standpoint.
The argument that buying a stock (through a 401k/mutual fund or directly, whichever) doesn't benefit the company also doesn't make sense. Part of the value of a stock derives from the fact that it can be resold. This will play into how much someone is willing to pay for the stock initially in the IPO, which does directly impact how much the company gets.
Even ticket scalping is arguably useful to a company selling the initial tickets. Yes, it "drives up" the price of a ticket, but its unclear that that is a bad thing of itself. The main thing it does is guarantee that tickets will on average go to those that value them more. Arguably someone who was able to buy a ticket because it was scalped could gain more than was lost by the person who wasn't able to buy that ticket because it was scalped. Essentially, value is being added to the system, and therefore it does not follow that the scalper is receiving money for nothing.
in some cases you can get an additional increase in salary by taking a 401K because companies put additional money in so there is an increase in profit not only from investing but from just having the program and the company awards those who plan for the future. That additional money could be used for greater good later on in life, it isnt always going to be used for selfish motivations. Just some quick thoughts as I listen to this in the background.
People can’t seem to see that the top of debate was specifically 401k’s. Which essentially is the act of taking your hard earned money, giving it to global financiers to invest into global companies that uproot local businesses and traditions in towns across the world, while you are unable to touch that money until you are retirement age. Instead of you using that money to invest in your local communities.
You aren’t required to invest in “global companies” in a 401k. You can invest in company stock. If you work for a firm, I would hope you believe the firm is moral. Therefore, why shouldn’t you be allowed to invest in your company in defer taxes so uncle Sam gets less. Also, Let me know when you find a local community that is so moral that you can’t find any reasons not to invest in it.
Exactly!
When any company goes public it then has to answer to a board of directors and shareholders that demands profit. This leads to companies cutting corners over time. Sending jobs overseas, using foreign materials, lowering wages, etc. This is just more exaggerated in the top Fortune 500 companies. The point is that the only investments into communities have been through 401k investments etc into these companies that ruin the local communities. If people started keeping their money local, instead of sending it to global financiers, the communities would be better off.
So we should not promote globalization? We should avoid helping other communities outside our own? Even though other countries may be better at producing a good, we should disregard that specialization exists. Sounds great in theory but I’m not sure the outcome is as good as it sounds.
@@austinlinsky1574 you think your helping other communities by helping create monopolies? Foreign trade is one thing, having global monopolies and financiers control world affairs through economics is another.
I have a lot of problems with the definitions used in Jacob's opening statement. First and foremost is that the mere ownership of stock is speculative, which he then buttressed with the ticket scalper analogy. The scalper is only a pariah in that he artificially limits the supply of the tickets to then unfairly raise the prices later on...what if I sell my tickets to a 3rd party broker at a loss since I can no longer attend the event, and the broker then sells to someone else at a fair price, making a small profit in the margin. Is that broker still being "speculative" like the scalper? Would it really be better that I let my ticket go to waste, the broker not have employment, and the other party not attend the event? Jacob asserts that owning stock is speculative, uses a false analogy to illustrate the assertion, and then quote mines for the evils of speculation...seems pretty superficial and weak.
The 3rd party broker is not the same as the scalper. The difference is clear.
A scalper buys out every ticket for a show that they can, to sell at an inflated price without adding any value. The 3rd party broker is acting as a service to resell only those unwanted tickets back to people at the correct price.
For a real world scenario, imagine an opera house is putting on a show and contracts with ticketmaster to provide an online service to attract customers, sell to a wide online audience, promote the show through their advertising banners and email lists, etc. Ticketmaster is the 3rd party broker you are talking about, and somebody that can no longer attend can refund their ticket through ticketmaster and it will be made available at the proper price to another attendee. The scalper buys out the tickets sold on ticketmaster, providing no online platform or email blasts or contract with the venue, etc. They simple deprive everybody of the proper use of the tickets to enjoy a show to make a profit for no work.
@@zz-bq1yw I (think) I agree with your distinction between a scalper and a 3rd party broker and with your Ticketmaster example. My question in my original comment was rhetorical. Do you think I presented something incorrectly, or are we in agreement? Not looking to fight or quarrel, just seeing if I understand you and the example you gave correctly.
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I'd dispute that scalping doesn't add any value. Scalping makes the tickets more available to those that value them more, some of whom would not have been able to purchase the ticket had it been bought out at the retail price (or "fair price", whatever that is).
For most people a 401K investment is a quick way to double your money when the company matches what you put into it therefore making it a vehicle to realize as much compensation for the value you are adding to your organization as possible.
Lawyer tip: don't answer your opponent's questions when you're crossing
I so want to have a drink with these guys! Jacob isn't wrong, per se, but I believe that he also isn't right about 401k plans. Neither is Trent wrong, but I believe he lost this debate. 401k plans are not accounts, properly speaking, but rather legal (read: "tax") arrangements applied to specific accounts. Within a 401k plan it is possible to buy and hold cash and/or commodities and/or precious metals and/or real estate and/or (most commonly and by an overwhelming margin) stocks and/or bonds. All of these different asset classes are available under 401k arrangements, de-jure if not de facto. To place the debate in Thomistic terms: this preponderance of outcome - "that 401k plans lead to an investment of assets primarily composed of stocks and bonds - is accidental, rather than essential to the nature of 401k plans. Technically, there is nothing immoral about participating in a "defined contribution plan" that a 401k essentially is, wherein the employer offers accounts with specific matching, vesting, and tax deferment options. One could then debate how assets are selected and managed, what constitutes "ownership" and "how 401ks make money" which, incidentally, is not always and everywhere through a "buy low and sell high" schema as Jacob claims. The bigger point is that one can, in fact, participate in a 401k without laboring under the pain of sin. 401k plans are not essentially immoral, as Jacob claims, though they may become so by virtue of a malformed or malicious implementation. That said: Jacob's vision and description of a better and more prosperous future that is neither enabled nor reflected in 401k participation rates is one that I find both appealing and persuasive.
I mean....it sounds like you side with Trent. You just admitted that 401ks aren't immoral...which was the point of the debate.
@@ajmeier8114 I do side with Trent, but I think Jacob carried the debate. They aren't the same question.
The debate was if 401k’s are acceptable in the church which was proven by Trent.
Jacob does not claim 401k's are essentially immoral. He claims they are generally immoral and what that means. Rewatch his opening statement. He also mentions this numerous times.
@@justinlovern1902 I think Jacob is conflating the 401(k) with the underlying assets. Most of his criticisms directly apply to the mutual funds and ETFs that are most often held within 401(k) accounts. But 401(k) accounts often contain cash, bond, and REIT (real estate investment trusts) investment options as well: these being some types of holdings Jacob either doesn't attack or explicitly endorses (cash). The 401(k) is strictly that mechanism that allows an employer + employee to co-contribute to an employee-owned account with preferential tax treatment. Treating the 401(k) as essentially an investment in passive mutual funds/ETFs is a mischaracterization, even though I can agree it is generally true. Jacob and Trent are both brilliant thinkers and great debaters. I believe Jacob is wrong on this issue because even beyond what I said, the church does NOT teach that investments in mutual funds or ETFs are immoral: neither generally nor essentially. That is Jacob's central holding. He makes a strong, but not-prevailing, case, which mostly fails on 1) its conflation of the two issues - the mechanism and the underlying assets - and 2) by his over-generalization that ETFs and Mutual Funds are speculative in nature. Many such funds employ long-term "buy-and-hold" strategies that are not properly framed as "speculative". These long-term holdings pay out dividends (not the same as profits, sure) even as the shares increase in value over time. This may be technically speculative, but no more so than buying a house, gold, tools, land... and yes, even investments in small-business that Jacob endorses. Small business investments are, while local, and indeed more personal, generally and properly framed as high-risk/high-reward investments: read "speculative." At the very least, they satisfy his very own definition of speculative investing. Therefore Jacob hasn't eliminated the speculative nature of his investment: only localized and personalized it. That may be better. It may be good: conformed to the truth and beauty of the human experience. But it's no less speculative.
I also feel like Trent is specifically ignoring many of Jacob's points.
Around 56:00 Trent says that Jacob's definition of speculation is "buying low and selling high".
Jacob already clarified that isn't the definition he's using, and is actually using an economic authoritative definition of speculation in which there is no value added to involve price increases.
Shortly after, Trent says that investing in 401(k) is justifiable because it helps companies to build capital. We already know from Jacob's opening statement that that is not true, as this form of investing is generally through mutual funds, not the purchasing of stock put on the market by the companies themselves. Little to none of the moneys invested in 401(k) actually go to the companies themselves. All of Trent's points have already been answered by Jacob, unfortunately I don't think Trent even realizes it.
One major issue I have with Jacob’s argument is that much of his objection is based on the de-personalized and indirect nature of these financial instruments. For example, investing in a 401k only produces indirect benefits for the companies invested in, and only benefits the current owners of the stock, not the company itself. But every publicly traded company is structured around this dynamic. The company is in fact measured by its stock performance. More indirectly, the market signals sent by such investing direct these companies. Your investment goes to someone who invested several degrees removed from the initial IPO investors - who themselves invested with the confidence that there would be a long line of investors after them.
If we dismiss this all as too indirect, then we have to dismiss all other economic considerations that are similarly indirect. The famous Milton Friedman example of how nobody knows how to make a pencil comes to mind.
My impression is that Jacob would agree with your implication, and simply also look askance at those other processes. He's also unlikely to be cool with how stocks and public trading in general.
Though he might also not care for the crazy levels it takes to manufacture pencils today. The difference with the pencil is that your action is simply buying the pencil, and so there is at least, from your end, a connection between your money and the actual product. in a 401k and other kinds of trading, the point is not to invest, properly understood as providing funds for the mutual good of the company to make and sell products, and you to take in a part in the profits/ risks, but to speculate on the state of the company.
@@maryangelica5319 I disagree with the proposition that the point is not to invest. It is exactly that, by providing a constant source of buyers for initial investors to rely on. There’s just a middle man between the funds and the company, in this case.
Of course, he also posits that dividends are not the same as a share of profits, which is idiosyncratic, at best.
@@CMVBrielman it was my understanding that dividends were set in stone changing of course over the company’s decision. But not a guaranteed percentage of the profits. Which is what I believe he is pointing out. That it’s not a sharing of profits but more of another incentive to not sell. He would most definitely agree that our property should be the productive investment not our bank account.
@@andrewdoty2518 I’m not sure I understand your point - dividends are most definitely not set in stone. Companies move them up or down depending on their circumstances, with many choosing not to offer dividends (offering dividends is seen - wrongly, in my mind - an implicit admission that your company is done growing). Any profitable company chooses how much of that profit goes into dividends and how much is re-invested back into the company.
@@CMVBrielman sorry for the late response I’m not good at checking notifications, but I would change the wording of what you said that it’s not profits that they are particularly sharing although it is a part. Like if a company has an insanely good quarter of sales they often don’t share that profit with stock holders because they set the dividend for that quarter before hand. They can change it for the future but it would not effect how much the stock holder receives for that quarter. Lmk if I am wrong
I have read Cenesimus Annus and the Catechism on the relevant points and it is tragic that Imam has read into these texts something that is not there based on a definition that he got from a secular economist writing a text that is decades old and, most importantly, is not a source for Papal encyclicals. He is committing a classic example of eisogesis and, in doing so, is foisting his own scrupulosity onto unexpecting and sincere Catholics. This is tragic and Imam needs to take very seriously the account he will give for this on the last day as teachers are judged more severely. He also needs to be more circumspect in publicly speaking negatively about our Bishops. There is quite enough of that and the example of saints is to show reverence for the Apostolic Office even when those who hold that office are not worthy of it.
One of the trends with heresy in theology is to be a rigorist. This was the error of Pelagius who held to very strict expectations about what was necessary for the moral life in order to be saved. Rigorism has been condemned by the Church and Imam is presenting a rigorist reading of Papal documents that rests entirely on a definition from someone who is not even a Catholic theologian. Again, this is tragic because it will harm souls. Imam is no doubt sincere (and likeable), but sincerity does not ensure orthodoxy. Nor does likeability.
The quote given by Trent at the end of the debate was prophetic. Imam is putting onto people's backs burdens that the Church does not require. May God's grace grant him the humility to recognize that he has absolutely no reason to think that JPII was reading Samuelson and that his favoring this definition as the meaning to be read into a papal encyclical is purely arbitrary (with only the appearance of erudition by noting a couple of Latin phrases). I have answered why it is unjust to sell something for more than what it is inherently worth and to buy something for less than it is inherently worth elsewhere and I have also addressed why it is absurd to think that selling something at a profit (above the rate of inflation) is immoral.
There are complexities to these questions that require familiarity not only with St. Augustine, St. Thomas, Leo XIII, and Pope St. John Paul II, but also require familiarity with language, definitions, exegetical principles, and economics. Imam has no expertise in economics and he has shown a complete lack of exegetical care in reading papal encyclicals by applying Samuelson's definition on them. He has chosen a difficult topic and has made subtle mistakes, but nonetheless has the boldness to present his "solutions" publicly when those solutions are novel (what Bishop or Pope has taught that investing in 401ks is immoral? No one. It requires the mistakes I have noted to arrive at that erroneous conclusion which is being read into Papal documents). My hope is that Imam will stop confusing people with errors and will work out these questions with theologians rather than disturbing God's people with subtle mistakes.
Amen!
I am disappointed in Trent's poor use of appeal to authority fallacy in the debate. He appeals to specific bishop's opinions (not magisterial teachings) and says they are more authoritative than the saint's or whoever Jacob references. Then he goes further and appeals to specifics bishops practices and says if they do it, surely it is good.
Jacob's reply to this illogical argument is to ask if the current bishops are known for being exceptionally holy and being amazing role models that we should follow. Trent then quotes Yoda saying that this is a dangerous thought to have.
This is complete trash as an argument in light of the terrible scandals plaguing our bishops specifically in the USA which Trent uses as a guide (USCCB).
According to this Argument of Trent's along with his "lack of a magisterial teaching specifically condemning a practice making said practice permissible", it makes any new sin not a sin until the magisterium gets around to defining it as such. (commented at 1:04:21 time stamp)
Similar to what another commenter said, I’m inspired by Brian but relieved by Trent. Money has always been something I been ambivalent or even fearful of because of the potential to corrupt (with too many non trivial examples in the world to be dismissed as worst case scenario thinking) but also has the capacity to do good
I think the major disconnect between the two is that Trent is arguing on behalf of what is textually legal, and defending those who in good faith make those investments, whereas Jacob is arguing based on Philosophy (or what SHOULD be condemned textually), and the overall impact on society. Jacob seems to to be always arguing based on taking small steps toward an ideal, even if those small steps are more difficult in the immediate.
Was contraception bad prior to Humanae Vitae? if so Then Trent's insistance that something be found by name in textual teaching falls flat to Jacob's point that if the underlying principles the Church has prohibit something then the thing itself is also prohibited.
Aptly put
@@thrsdy1795 I like the idea your making, but Humane Vitae was a reaffirmation of the church's position
It's worrisome to think of the scrupulous people who will liquidate their 401ks because of Jacob's financial advice.
Yeah that would be rough. Hopefully doesn't happen.
What if they clear out their 401ks and invest in farmland? Then the stock market continues to decline and farmland continues to be stable or increase in value? Then they would be glad they took his advice.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 Yeah, because farmland is cheap... especially bidding against Blackrock. The stock market always bounces back, especially with inflation. Look at the last 100 years. There is a huge tax penalty for exiting your 401k, and people would probably lose out on an employer match. I understand the moral argument, but it is fiscally illogical.
@@24erstad You don't have to buy 10,000 acres. You can buy 40, that would sell for a lot less than the average college educated corporate employee has in their 401k. Look back at the last 100 years of farmland prices. At some point the US stock market will resemble Japan's (especially with the massive government debt we have).....large investment firms obviously bid up the price of equity's too, in fact a far larger portion of the value of stocks is owned by institutions than is farmland.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 right, but in that case they'd be buying something in order to seek a profit and it would also be wrong based on Jacobs criterian. So that wouldn't work either 👌🏻
Jacobs argument was too hard to follow. Even Trent had a hard time understanding his argument. Some investments lijr gold are ok if bought without the intent for it to go up in value, but because it retains it's value well against fiat? Makes no sense.
I don't know if Jacob is right about this, but what he's saying is that gold will buy you (roughly) the same amount of something (I'll use bread as an example) no matter the value of money. So if in 2000 you could buy a loaf for 1 dollar or 1 oz of gold, then in 2020 even if a loaf cost 100 dollars it would still be just 1 oz of gold. So even though the gold is now technically worth 100 dollars, the amount you can buy with it is the same so you haven't actually profited.
@@alexv7113 right, but in that case you would have bought it so that it went up in value against the fiat you hold, so it seemed like he was contradicting himself.
@@carniedph Not up in value, maintaining a steady value, like an immunity to inflation. So you're buying it not to gain money but to not lose money.
Protestant listening in. I think one of the main issues is that our entire monetary system is sinful and needs to be reformed.
Intent may have to do with this issue. You both had hearty retorts and arguments. Good presentation.
@pintswithaquinas thanks so much for having these great debates. This and the Gideon Lazar debate are great!
Radical Converts vs American Normies!
1:14:50 If Trent is going to put up self up to defend 401k's and stock market he should be able to explain what the stock market is and why companies go public. I get that he was making a point that companies act in their own self interest but specifics and details would have really helped the is conversation. Specifics about the motivations and benefits of a company going public, and why investors buy into this system would have given them both a lot more credibility.
I would say suggesting somebody own rental properties completely undercuts all of Jacob’s arguments. I’m only owning rental property to turn a profit, nothing more. Passive income.
Which he claims is immoral.
I'm not sure that owning rental properties completely undercuts Jacob's arguments. I would argue that owners of rental properties are providing a service that has to be maintained when things break and wear out and they don't have use of their home when it is rented out. The owner is actually providing value for the rent money. Also, the owner has the risk that at some time in the future the price to sell the property could be less depending on the economy or other factors.
@@tylerjohnson9626 I wholly disagree. Why are you buying more homes than you need? Out of the goodness of your heart? Nobody does that. The whole point of a rental property is passive income and a return on your investment.
I.e., it's an investment for the sole purpose of profit, which Jacob condemned repeatedly.
@@tylerjohnson9626 What? 401ks, if you don't maneuver, are 100% at risk at losing the capital or value/stock price in a mutual fund. Muitual funds just don't go up and up and up; they are very cyclic and demands that an employee be prudent by maneuvering noting most do not which makes the entire notion throughout the debate of buying low and selling high a total misnomer and a total mis perception of reality
Speculation is the only reason we have market crashes- I think this alone is reason enough to call all Christians to pull their money from speculative markets and to lobby for its abolition but at the very least decrease its effect on us and our communities as much as possible.
The difficulty in assessing this debate is that the Church was completely and utterly blindsided by modernity and philosophical/economic liberalism. It should have acted as quickly to develop a theology of the market as it did with a theology of sexuality. The fact that it did not probably has to do with how difficult it is to imagine economic alternatives, as well as the perceived need of Catholic states to economically modernize to compete with the Protestant states which invented the modern economy. New Polity and the American edition of Communio are developing that theology, among others.
Another dynamic going on here is that Horn is quite comfortable and unreflectively comfortable in the current political paradigm, whereas Imam is a thinker trying to investigate alternatives. 1:41:36 1:41:36
Economic liberalism is not necessarily a uniquely protestant invention. This idea is popular but wrong.
Catholic thinkers have been talking about thinking about economic manners for centuries, in particular the school of Salamanca in Spain.
Jacob has a heart of gold. But I’m not convinced.
Why?
Another point of Imam that is a mistake is the suggestion that no good is done by the money put in the 401ks. There are in fact two goods that come from putting money in 401ks. The first is the good of economic growth and the jobs that this provides. Without 401ks and other means of public investing, IPOs would never occur. When a company goes public (an Initial Public Offering), the capital raised through this allows for the company to grow and increases the amount of jobs that are available. After this IPO, what does Imam suggest? That those who bought the company are not allowed to sell it when they need the money for retirement? Well, that would undermine all capitalism which is something that is *not* in line with Church teaching.
A second good that is done (besides providing jobs) is the good of allowing people to support themselves and their families when they can no longer work. So, yes, goods are accomplished through 401ks even if those who are not familiar with economics are not aware of those goods. Again, Imam needs to understand how all this works before making these arguments.
The point Imam is making, if it were correct, would not just apply to 401ks. It would apply to capitalism in general. He is suggesting that I must produce something through my own labor in order to draw some financially beneficial use of a growth of my money. This is a pseudo-principle that undermines capitalism entirely. The pseudo-principle would appeal to Marx, but it is not the teaching of the Catholic Church. Greed is condemned by the Church, but capitalism is not.
1:38:00 "It's the mindset that's bad; not the 401k." Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding! WE HAVE A WINNER!
As someone who has struggled with scrupulosity, including specifically about investment because of some of Jacob's arguments, I deeply appreciated Trent's closing statement. I respect Jacob for encouraging people to think carefully about their investments and to intentionally build Christian communities, but he goes too far when he insists that investing in 401k's (and in the stock market in general, though this debate didn't concern that) is immoral, and it's important to take note of the damage such views can cause.
The argument based on the supposed immorality of buying low and selling high would virtually shut down all commerce. That's literally the central premise of all retail business.
Look into their conference on is America a tyranny on how immorality is deeply ingrained in our economy for example
Retail businesses are selling *actual* goods which will be used. They buy low and sell high to cover the cost of acquiring the goods, staffing the store, and bringing otherwise unavailable goods to local customers.
In Jacob's first example he explained that stocks are like buying a ticket to a game from a scalper, and you in turn scalp that same ticket for a higher price - but no one ever goes to the game. There is no exchange of any actual goods in a stock purchase.
Stores provide an actual important service of getting goods from producers to consumers. That is where the just profit they recieve comes from.
@@cactoidjim1477 Weird, because I didn’t realize that when I buy a ticket from a scalper, I am acquiring part ownership of the team. That’s what he and you are missing. You’re not getting nothing when you buy a stock. You’re getting ownership of the company. It might not be a lot, but if you pull your ownership with other people of like mines, you can literally manage the company and change the way it operates. Sorry for any misspellings or bad grammar, as I am using Siri.
@@cactoidjim1477 perhaps you explain more, but isn’t that when you buy stock the idea is that the company will become more successful and you can sell for profit.
2:03:35 This captures the essence of what went wrong this debate. I respect Trent, but this is simply an ad hominem.
I have to listen to Jacobs whole argument but I’m not sure he made his case. I’m extremely skeptical of boomer economics but I still not convinced of Jacobs argument.
Check out his podcast then, he’s goes more in depth then
@@andrewdoty2518 perhaps you could help me out, what is he talking about stocks not having any association with their company. I’m no expert but one assumes companies sell stock in order to benefit themselves.
@@stcolreplover in the initial public offering they do, but after that on the secondary market the company themselves is not receiving you money. They go public to make a good quick sum of cash
Edit: spelling. And clarify
@@thrsdy1795 so after that it’s a very big disadvantage?
@@stcolreplover no after that the people making the decisions (the board) on behalf of the company own large sums of this stock so they PERSONALLY profit if it goes up while the Corp itself sees very little (effectively none) of this money
I lost all interest in Trent as a debater after watching his debate against socialism and his debate for Feminism back to back. Seeing his lack of intellectual honesty and consistency really put me off his work in general
Now why is it immoral to obtain money even if the work is simple or even almost non existent? To me I can’t see how that’s immoral. Simply not working or not Doing much work isn’t immoral by itself and then getting paid for that should be alright if the work was down prior. Investing is always work no matter how little effort. People even spend years creating systems just for money. As the years pass they may spend no more years Doing work, yet they still get paid. I don’t see how that is evil because money isn’t evil, it’s how the money is used
I want to say Jacob but only for that fact that his views imply mountains of faith. You know dont even take a second cloak kind of faith or the birds dont store up food in a barn kinds of faith
Seems to me that Trent is leaning toward the end justifying the means whereas Jacob’s position is that the means of a 401(k) is itself is immoral, which I believe I agree with. Trent’s arguments seem to be because the 401(k) is the most common form of saving for retirement (which is a good) the means must be good as a result otherwise people could not save for retirement.
I don’t see how investing or giving money essentially blind to people who only seek profit not the common good so that you can achieve a profit, even if you use such profits in a moral way can be good. Like Jacob says such a view is utilitarian and not Christian
Buying a company stock does not give that company money. It gives the person selling the stock money in exchange for a partial ownership of that company, thereby giving you a right to a percentage of that company's profits.
Jacob keeps asking how people saved for retirement before 401Ks. The most direct answer is that people tended to work for the same company their entire life, and those companies had defined-benefit pension plans, most of which no longer exist.
Also, a 401K is just a particular tax-benefited way of investing in the stock market. People used to still save for retirement by investing in the stock market, it is just more of their money went to the government in the form of taxes, which can't possibly be a moral improvement.
Amen! As I said in my comments, one can contend that both the IRA and 401K came to be due to the inability of those companies to provide a pension since people were living longer and the notion that after all the baby boomers retire, social security is at risk also for the same reason!
Essentially Trent's point is that something isn't arguably immoral unless explicitly stated in the catechism.
I find that incredibly hard to agree with.
The catechism is bound by physical restraints, it can't hold all of the conceivably immoral actions humans can contrive, hence why the catechism is an ever growing document.
The fact that we have debates like this is proof that we're willing to contemplate the morality of actions on a deeper level than that prescribed by the catechism (of course without denying church teaching).
Trent basically just continues to contemplate on the morality of actions any farther than that discussed in the catechism, which he knows full well is a growing document.
*refuses* to contemplate, my apologies.
Jacob continuously states that investing in 401k’s is done only to make a profit. This is not true. I invest in my 401k as a hedge against inflation. I don’t expect a huge profit from it, I only expect it to provide me with the same buying power in the future.
This is a good point. One could also want to invest in 401k to diversify one's financial assets. Putting all your eggs in one basket (gold) is very risky.
Especially because of the match, which wasn't even addressed
I think trents more nuanced view of the church's position is the correct one. Jacob's is arbitrary and wills poverty on everyone and cans be quite dangerous
He doesn't force poverty on anyone. Poverty also is not the worst thing in the world. The poorest people in the U.S. are still super rich compared to the truly materially poor around the world. Being smart with your finances is great, but idolizing them and wanting only profit is not.
Although 401k don't affect me I watched this to see if there's anything relevant to my thoughts about ETFs. TBH I think Imam has very poor understanding of investing, different vehicles and how much work and learning is required to actually invest even if doing it passively. I think he's confusing it with gambling.
What I find bizarre is that Imam "knows" why most people are investigating, yet he can't tell why most people are playing lotteries when pressed by Trent, and refers to his own motives which are irrelevant. Best regards and thanks for hosting.
It was really disappointing to see Trent fall into the correlation-causation fallacy around the 37-38 min mark. The fact that the standard of living increased while stock market investing was ubiquitous does not imply that it happened because of stock market investing. That was really sloppy.
2 well spoken men debating over a subject I have no funds for nor am I interested in it.
How about that this venue tackles the real ills surrounding us . eg . What can we do about the drugs destroying so many young lives or simpler things eg. the need to lie . Cheers
Jacob's assertion that the bishops don't teach on these things is false. Just yesterday, Bishop Paprocki gave an interview with the Pillar in which he discussed the moral imperative to buy from and invest in ethical companies. It seems clear from this debate though that Jacob's ideas are leading him closer and closer to dissenting from the magisterium. It would be one thing if he were promoting these views as an academic theologian who engaged with other academics in debate, but using a public platform to promote a highly speculative personal theological opinion to those without the academic training to properly evaluate them is extremely problematic (and in my view profoundly imprudent and immoral). Matt should stop having Jacob on and giving him the opportunity to unnecessarily burden people's consciences.
Jacob just did his PhD at Oxford on the ethics of money. He's not some random guy speaking on this.
@@thebyzantinescotist7081 the quality of European PhDs aside, Jacob is still advocating for a position that is extremely speculative (he's the only person I've ever heard articulate it) and is at least prima facia at variance with the teaching of the Church (look, for example, at what the Compendium of the Church's social teaching says about modern financial instruments). It is imprudent to burden people's consciences with highly speculative ideas on a public platform like this. If he were an academic, writing in academic journals I wouldn't mind so much (I would still think his argument is silly though, since it seems to rely entirely on equivocation and ignorance of how stocks work).
@@smashandburn1 I think just the same. His attitude is totally imprudent.
@@thebyzantinescotist7081 That's honestly hilarious. Did he get a business degree first? Or did he work in a business? Or is he a do nothing that sits in an ivory tower living off a university endowment telling people what to do with their money that he has no idea how they earned it?
And worst of all living off generations of saving and investments while telling you not to save and invest money.
It's good to hear Jacob out on this. It's good because he certainly offers good truths about vigilance on where our money goes, and using our money to build up God's Kingdom. However, misapplication of moral principles towards the stock market leads him to be incorrect on the immorality of 401ks.
Everyone here should go read the USCCB's guidelines for investing. I'm not surprised Trent Horn didn't bring this up since it seriously hinders his case.
Trent did bring this up. Principle 1 states “The Conference should exercise responsible financial stewardship over its economic resources. In practical fiscal terms, this means obtaining a reasonable rate of return on investments. A reasonable rate of return is considered one that matches the level of the market or at the least allows the Conference to meet its fiduciary responsibilities and maintain its mission. This requires prudence and caution in terms of the risks taken or not taken.”
Principle 2 states “The Conference should exercise ethical and social stewardship in its investments. Socially responsible investment involves investment strategies based on Catholic moral principles. These strategies are based on the moral demands posed by the virtues of prudence and justice. They recognize the reality that socially beneficial activities and socially undesirable or even immoral activities are often inextricably linked in the products produced and the policies followed by individual corporations. Nevertheless, by prudently applying traditional Catholic moral teaching, and employing traditional principles on cooperation and toleration, as well as the duty to avoid scandal, the Conference can invest wisely and ethically.”
If we apply this to individuals, even though the documents does not indicate that it should be, then we are left with something along the lines of: individuals should invest to meet their needs and should do so, when possible, in an ethical way. The challenge is that the individual may not have the same options as a large institution such as the USCCB. That said, many individuals increasingly do have this option as self directed brokerage options are becoming more prevalent and the range of ethical investment options are expanding.
@@Matt-el8tl I agree, if we have the ability to do so, we definitely should. I'm struggling to find a grave necessity that would push someone to invest in companies that pay people to violently rip apart and murder their children. This is what the conference says in regard to these types of companies:
"For companies where it is discovered that there is some tangential connection to abortion, euthanasia, or assisted suicide related issues, the USCCB will engage companies through corporate dialogues, proxy voting, and support of shareholder resolutions to eliminate this connection."
The vast majority of mutual/index funds involve companies that pay for child-murder travel benefits, as well as companies that produce contraception, use slave labor, etc, yet no one is buying into mutual and index funds for the purpose of changing the hundreds of companies that are in there, and they don't have the ability to either as far as I know. The purpose of these funds is to diversify your money to secure a profit down the road. Therefore, you should find funds that go along with the conference's guidelines, especially if we increasingly have the ability to do so like you mentioned.
@@grantbenson7458 That’s my entire point. Jacob wants to throw the baby out with the bath water, to invoke “The Benedict Option.” There is another route here. He could be telling people:
- Look to see if you have a brokerage option within your 401k.
- If you do, then use it and consider these type of companies / funds instead.
- If you don’t, then send a letter to your company’s investment committee requesting that they add one. Bonus points for providing people a template letter that they can just print off, sign and send. This is the type of stuff that Catholic Vote does all the time.
All in all, we can be in the world but not of the world. The suggestion that 401k are immoral is like suggesting we all move to desert.
Jacob has JOY to accompy his excellent arguments.
Rather than assuming that the popes read the economist Samuelson, Imam needs to do the hard exegetical work of determining what a particular Pope means by the term in the relevant papal document. Just as it does in biblical studies, eisogesis of papal encyclicals does not help our understanding of Church teaching. It diminishes it.
The key to the quotes given by Augustine and Aquinas is that it is wrong to sell something for more than it is inherently worth. The virtue of justice (giving to each what is due) is the key here. If someone were to buy something for less than it is worth and then sell the same thing for more than it is worth, this would be unjust. The key difference with buying and selling stocks is that the inherent value of companies ***increase*** over time based on their earnings (and based on inflation something that was not part of economics with St. Augustine and St. Thomas). If I buy Walmart in 1980 getting 30k worth of shares and the company balloons such that those same shares are worth 1 million dollars in 2010, I do nothing wrong by selling the stock in 2010 for what it is worth (making 970k in profits).
As noted by Trent, if buying low when something is worth little and selling it after is appreciates is wrong, then it is wrong to buy and sell a house after it appreciates and it is wrong to buy and sell a privately owned business when it grows and appreciates (An investor is an owner of a publicly traded company). If the argument is that it must simply keep pace with inflation, this would entail that you never sell a product, like a house, when there is an asset bubble in the market you are selling it in (a real estate bubble). Or it would entail that you do the work to determine the fair value based on your own inflation calculations. I wonder Jacob, should they use the CPI or another measure for this? This only adds to the existing scrupulosity upon which Imam builds his teaching.
As a professional financial/wealth advisor, I try to conduct all aspect of my practice as a professional Christian especially the relationship aspect. I believe I have righteously assisted hundreds of retiree’s to sound decisions and I really work hard for my clients. Mutual funds is a great part of allocation and much research goes into hiring a qualified fund manager and understanding their philosophy and approach; not speculation if there’s technical and fundamental conclusions. Speculation is relying on luck and perceived opportunities - driven by biases. I only guide my clients to securities if they believe and somewhat understand the concept of silent ownership of a company and if I see signs of no interest in the reality of the idea, I present other options. To say mutual funds are speculation and leave it at that is to not understand the concept of hiring a professional manager to assist in buying companies, as I hire many other types of professional, e.g., Gardner and real estate agent.
Were any of those righteous assistants involved in:
Leveraged acquisition?
Hostile takeover?
Post-launch layoffs?
Offshoring?
Commercializing residential properties?
Zoning lobbies?
USURY????
Trent is putting on a masterful demolition of Jacob's case. I like Jacob a lot, but he goes too far and struggles with scrupulosity. Coming from a lawyer, Trent argued his case far better than Jacob did and used much more substantive proof where Jacob uses mostly his opinion.
Imam conflates speculation with investment.
Really good discussion. Thank you.
Trent won the first half by a landslide. Jacob won the cross-exam by belligerently dominating the discussion but didn't win the argument. I'm surprised at how passive and rattled Trent was here. Anyone who feels Jacob won the overall debate is either a relative/friend, a professor who has never left the library (sound familiar?), as naive of an idealist as Jacob, or all three.
Jacob argues about the subject like one who has never actually worked with or held a 401K but has merely read about them and yet feels qualified to speak authoritatively on them. And he conveniently urges Trent to stick to the premise of the debate when it works in his favor, yet refused to address secondary and tertiary arguments that are necessary to the primary. He jumps around and talks out both sides of this mouth on this one.
In short, Jacob is a naive idealist who loves proposing controversial arguments from the safety of his New Polity bubble in downtown Steubenville. I would love to open up his bathroom cabinet and point out every example of hypocrisy he owns.
EVERY time you purchase a product, you are not just paying for the good. You are directly investing in the manufacturing company and its future, whether you like it or not. Oh I forgot: "We're arguing about 401Ks here." How convenient Jacob. And he claims that working for profit alone is immoral yet fails to support his position because remember "we're only talking about 401Ks here." Apparently a worker making widgets who hates his job yet is only in it for the money, but is paying for his kids is moral. Yet if his profits are going to retirement he is living in sin. According to St. Jacob of course. His position was sloppy and unconvincing. The sad thing is that there MAY BE an argument to be made against 401Ks, yet Jacob is unqualified and ill-prepared to make that argument.
Overall: Here's a novel idea--why not bring on debaters with at least an ounce of financial knowledge/expertise instead of these two who haven't shred of authority with which to speak on this subject? Trent wins this one, however, because at least he maintains some adherence to logic.
Amen, so obvious, I am surprised there has been any discussion to the contrary
I understand most of us have 401k investments but Trent was beaten from a debate perspective here. Unnecessarily polemical, not clearly understanding Jacob's arguments
Was it just me or was Trent resorting to a lot of ad hominem? And it seemed to fall so flat with such a kind, articulate, and intelligent opponent.
I came here to find this comment.
Agree.
You don't see the irony in your comment?
An ad hominem attacks the person rather than the argument, and your defense of Jacob is to defend his person rather than his argument, which is the reverse of ad hominem and called style over substance fallacy. Jacob is most certainly kind, articulate, and intelligent, but that doesn't make his argument correct. See the irony now?
I'm not sure if they were ad hominems, but he did frequently go ofter other things Jacob has claimed that were totally irrelevant to the debate. Bad form, in my opinion.
@@justinlovern1902 as I recall, Horn was referencing things that actually WERE relevant to the debate. Jacob seemed quick to retreat back to the debate premise on 401ks specifically even though his assertions on speculation and investment undergird his entire argument.
I didn't know this was a controversy.
This was a great debate. Generally, I think Trent is correct in his cautions, but I think Jacob is correct in that Catholics need to much more conscious and conscientious investors. We need to worry as much (even more) about whether our investments are being used to build the kingdom of God, and of building authentic Catholic culture. I would love to see Jacob and New Polity provide more POSITIVE guidance on how Catholics can invest their money wisely and morally.
Yet another Catholic speaker placing undue burdens on the faithful to forward their own misunderstandings about doctrine. This is the new "woke" within the Church, that instead of being progressively, teach regressively; surfing through the Church Fathers and taking them as inspired sources to promote alleged more virtuous decisions and even to deter from so-called immoral practices. We classic apologists have to engage these people within our Church more often.
I commend Jacob for drawing attention St. Thomas' teaching in II-II q. 78 but I think he misunderstands what Aquinas is saying and how it applies to investing. It's critical to note that Aquinas thinks that investing in a business is perfectly moral: "On the other hand he that entrusts his money to a merchant or craftsman so as to form a kind of society, does not transfer the ownership of his money to them, for it remains his, so that at his risk the merchant speculates with it, or the craftsman uses it for his craft, and consequently he may lawfully demand as something belonging to him, part of the profits derived from his money" (II-II, q. 78, a. 2, ad. 5). Generally speaking, a 401k rises in value over time because the companies the investor owns shares in have grown more valuable by, for example, expanding into new markets or introducing new products. There are certainly ways to speculate in securities markets (eg., profiting from intraday price fluctuations, trading in derivatives, etc.), but these are generally not the kinds of activities a 401k investor is involved in. When it comes to investing in the stock market, Imam has it flipped - I think it's generally moral but can be immoral (or at least misguided or tending towards endless unmerited gain) in specific cases. These specific cases are widespread among institutional investors, to be sure, and are likely what Pope St. John Paul II had in mind when criticizing financial markets, but they do not concern the average person contributing to their 401k. Please correct me if I'm wrong!!
Thank you for providing that Aquinas quote. That is very important to this debate and should not be overlooked.
I think Jacob has some good points about the economy broadly, that the trend is less tangible work and more distractions for our eyes and bodies and the bloat of certain industries like banking and tech
Trent missed the mark on his opening statement, he should have spent more time emphasizing what it means for something to be generally immoral and how Catholics can know when something is: through the extraordinary magisterium or the ordinary and universal magisterium, unless something is made manifestly clear in scripture. Even with this gaffe, Trent was able to demonstrate from more authoritative teachings than Jacob provided that the church has not taught that it is generally immoral to invest in a 401(k), which left Jacob with arguments that might have been convincing for why one shouldn't invest in one, but that didn't prove the resolution that both sides were trying to argue for. This wasn't a good debate on the whole, and it felt like a waste of time to listen to either extremely low magisterial teachings on the topic of investing and reasons for/against investing being good.
It should be clear from the lack of authoritative sources from Catholic teaching that it is not the case that it is generally immoral to invest in 401(k)'s, unless the church has been so deceived that it doesn't even recognize in a clear authoritative capacity that an activity that its faithful and clergy engage in as immoral, in which case you are in the wrong church.
🙌🙌🙌🙌
Trent assumes that the vast majority of companies that are on the typical 401k provide for the common good. If the common good is protecting life and promoting peace then the typical modern company does not engage in that at all. Also Trent seems to believe that any typical modern innovation is always oriented toward the common good, but after reading the abolition of man I just have to disagree with that premise.
Ok, sell your computer then bro
As a Catholic who thinks about Moral Investing for a living, it is tough to say who won this debate. I am leaning towards giving Jacob the edge here because the topic was 401K’s and they promote passive investing which to Jacob’s point is doing something solely for profit (I am sympathetic to the cause of providing for the future of your family, but not at the expense of funding the nefarious companies that are in almost all 401K products). However, I do not agree with Jacob that all stock market investing is immoral. If you were to invest in an individual company that promotes the common good (Say a Nuclear Energy Company or a Catholic publishing company), that does not participate in nefarious things like child labor, pornography, or abortion, and you are active in shareholder meetings then I do not see the moral issue from a commons sense perspective or from a Church Magisterium perspective. It seems to me that you are doing work in your research (lack of research is why 401K’s are morally wrong in my lay persons opinion) and putting forth time and energy, you would presumably want the company to grow not just to reap a financial profit but also so that the common good is increased.
I believe Jacob’s rebuttal to this would just be to send the company money directly, but this is not prudent (which is a virtue) as a man is due his wage for his work and investing takes, if nothing else, brain power, which is work. I send money to a company, and it helps the company and promotes the common good, but I get nothing in return, this is of course not immoral, but it also ignores the fact that by buying stock in a company I can introduce a third good, namely the potential financial reward for myself and my family. If I have the option of doing something good for three people/causes/entities, why would I choose to do something that is only good for two people/causes/entities? Not to mention that by buying the stock of that company you have increased the volume at which that company is traded and therefore encouraged more of the market to back that company and this all allows that company to increase its reach and hiring ability which would promote the common good. Plus, you have a type of ownership now in the company and can make your voice heard.
I have a major problem with Trent’s reasoning on using an iPhone being the same as investing in Apple. Purchasing a good/service does not carry the same moral weight that investing does because investing is always what you do with your excess. Now maybe you do not need that iPhone and you bought it with excess income but that is a conversation in of itself. Take this more clear-cut example; Amazon is a nefarious company (It funds abortion, supports Transgender Ideology, kills small businesses, and does a whole bunch of other illicit things) if you choose to invest in Amazon, you are only doing so because you want to get a nice ROI or you want to actively support nefarious things. However, if you are a single parent with young children who is going through a financial hardship and Amazon is the cheapest and easiest way to buy diapers, so you buy them from Amazon. Does buying the diapers carry the same moral culpability as investing in Amazon? I don’t think we need an official teaching from the church to tell us the answer to this question.
Both debaters make great points, and both are great at what they do. I know Jacob personally and he always strikes me as someone after the heart of Christ, but like all people (Myself included) both debaters have some flaws in their thinking…I think.
401K’s are bad because they really don’t require any work on part of the owner, and they almost always have nefarious companies in their holdings.
Stock Market investing I believe can be morally acceptable if research on a specific company is done by the individual, the company promotes the common good, the company does not engage in blatantly Christian opposed practices, and the investor is actively trying to make his voice heard within the company. Yes, we want to make a profit, but we also need to be concerned with common good and be active investors rather than passive investors.
Thank you for a wonderfully thought out comment, it has really helped. A question, if you don't mind: When you say investing is licit if you are actively trying to make your voice heard within the company (given the other moral conditions are met), it seems to me that would be virtually impossible to do within a publicly traded company (for a person of middle class wealth) because of the size of such a company and the separation you have from the boardroom. This would leave only small private companies, and local businesses as the only valid ways to invest. Do you find this to be the case?
@@BrazilianPride22041 I would say that private companies and local businesses are a more moral investment (if specified conditions are met) than investing in the market, but that does not make investing in the market immoral. I would draw attention to the fact that you are promoting the company to others by investing in it and ever so slightly increasing the volume. However, if you attempt to make your voice heard and you are met with slammed doors, it may be wise to seek out another company that is more receptive. However, in my personal experience (I hate using anecdotal evidence) most companies are pretty accommodating to all shareholders, it is just in their best interest. The thinking of a major company is that if this person who only owns two shares has this thought and is actually willing to express it, then most likely there are a lot more people who have the same thought.
@@ChristCenteredCapital Thanks for the response, very much worth considering. And I appreciate the evidence, however anecdotal, as I have zero experience calling up companies I hold shares in to voice concern.
@@BrazilianPride22041 Also, it is worth noting that voicing a concern or an idea to a company that is in alignment with your moral convictions is drastically different than getting your voice heard in a company that is staunchly opposed to your moral convictions. I may call company XYZ and say they should promote product X to a specific market, and they may listen to me or give me reasons as to why they have not done so. But if I call up company 123 who is opposed to my Christian Ethics and tell them to stop funding Planned Parenthood, I will most likely get met with no response at all unless I am a very "significant" shareholder. But it is always worth a shot.
Yeah, the idea of letting my money be funneled without knowing the exact moral stances of the people using it has always bothered me. Being direct and intentional, not passive, is the more intelligent way to invest your money. If there's a cause or company I believe in and we can help each other out, then I am all for it. People are used to not seeing the effects of their actions because everything is so disconnected and money is just numbers on a screen.
Not sure I'm following this opposition to "buy low sell high". Like, every company that produces something must do this to exist. The lumber yard must sell the wood at a price higher than what it cost them to buy the wood, otherwise there would be no gross profit to pay their employees.
The issue is that the selling high, in the case of the 401k, but also with speculation in general, is not due to any additional value the seller is putting into the product besides his money, but rather because he is trying to predict how much the product will be valued in the market independent of what he does to it.
Buying some land or a home and developing it is one thing; you are actually working that land and making it more valuable for some function, so you should be compensated for that labor in addition to the value of the land when you sell it. But speculation involves buying and selling without any modification of the product, and making the decision solely based on how land is generally valued in the market.
The lumber yard is likely putting some value into the wood (the labor it takes to get and prepare the wood).
@@maryangelica5319 Your example may work for very small companies that have no type of operating expenses, but for most there are many necessary people (and other overhead) in addition to this who aren't contributing directly to cost of goods sold. But pick any large company and my guess is they can't sustain on sales alone. There is generally some type of periodic capex, for example, that requires additional capital to be had (for companies large and small). We can dive into financial statements to investigate, as I'm just "speculating" to be honest ; )
The gain on investment is correlated to growth of the company invested in. It's not independent of the original investment, it's supported and enabled by the investment.
@@maryangelica5319 401Ks are a benefit to the employee due to the match. The match is provided by the employer to attract [higher matches] employees because of the work, talent and efforts the employee provides the employer on a daily basis
Time Stamp 1:40:00, I was really hoping Trent would better explain his poor use of appeal to authority, but rather than answer the question he dodges to saying to follow the authority of the magisterium. Trent did not reference magisterial teachings but rather the actual practices of specific bishops and then acts as if there are not many bishops supporting evils through their actions and/or words. Really disappointing. The media gas-lights us enough, we don't also need it from Catholic lay leaders.
This NEEDS a follow up discussion that goes in depth in the different sources. I think it was a mistake not to share sources beforehand. This way, the participants are in danger of quote-mining because noone knows the context of when St. Thomas or St. Augustine said "[10000 words...] it's bad to speculate [10000 words...]".
I think St. Thomas actually allows a certain kind of speculation with the example of the coal tradesman. So actually the discussion is kind of worthless to the extent that you don't carve out the details. But it still was a great start and not worthless at all but establishing grounds for future debate hopefully. Because Trent is 100 % right that we cannot allow scrupulous people to mislead impressionable souls into throwing away their financial future (and maybe losing their Faith in the process). On the other hand, Jacob made some good points as well which if they weren't so extreme (accusing men of sin for following current financial wisdom which is NOT usurious and certainly allowed by Church officials as Trent pointed out) would actually merit discussion as well.
Literally buying S&P 500 shares to make money to take care of my parents in their old age over here...
If your buying it in your 401k, which is the argument of the debate, you can’t touch that money until your at retirement age without taking on massive penalties and taxes.
@@coreychuba they’re saying “401k”but I don’t think they really were talking about the legal structure that allows pre-tax contributions. They probably should have said mutual or index funds which I think is what they were actually talking about. If I’m not mistaken you can invest in US dollars or municipal bonds in a 401k.
I'm a homemaker.
@@jacobrodriguez7771 correct or also in a money market fund/cash like a bank, but with the match makes your decision much more prudent to overcome inflation. You can also invest in REITS typically
I feel like neither side really clarified the idea of “solely for the sake of profit”. Other than a Scrooge McDuck type who gets some kind of greedy kick out of having more and more money for its own sake, no one works or invests only for the sake of profit. People seek money and profit as a means to something else weather it be necessities, charity, or pleasantries all of which can contribute to the common good. Jacob seems to miss this point and seemingly equates profit seeking whole cloth with unjustifiable greed. While I absolutely respect what Jacob is trying to do, Trent’s point about this discussion having a scrupulous or pharsaiacal character hits home for me. For transparency I am someone who both has a 401k and struggles with scrupulous tendencies.