Event Recap

At Azusa Pacific University on Nov. 28, Values & Capitalism program manager Josh Good addressed a group of 118 students, faculty and friends of the college on the topic: "Real Help for the Poor: Faith, Charity and (Effective) Compassion."  

The lecture examined the scope of our federal entitlement programs, which have vastly increased in the last 50 years, offering a breakdown of current means-tested programs designed to serve low-income Americans. As public spending on these initiatives has vastly increased in recent decades, many indicators suggest a broad departure from the characteristics observed by Alexis de Tocqueville in 1835: Americans; "fierce independence," sense of personal accountability, and "optimistic Puritanism."

For Christian students interested in serving the poor through personal relationships, congregation-based forms of assistance, and subsidiarity-based assistance (rather than bureaucratic programs alone), tremendous opportunities today exist. This lecture—and a lively round of Q&A—focused on concrete examples and introduced students to our series of books that link a renewal of our free enterprise system with positive policy reforms. 

The lecture and a corresponding workshop on "Navigating Public Policy Jobs and Internships," which hosted 21 students, was co-sponsored by AEI's Values & Capitalism project and by APU's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.