HAVE YOU ever downloaded music from the internet? Do you know anyone else who has? Have you ever sent a copy of a song you liked to a friend? When you did, were you sharing a treasured experience and giving a gift, or were you shoplifting and passing along stolen goods? Those are different images […] Read more
Stories by Christopher Lind
Economic recession has us seeking lifeline – The Moral Economy
THERE IS A story I often heard in Saskatchewan about a farmer who had to make his way to the barn in the middle of a blizzard. To find his way back to the house, he tied a rope to the back door. When he was finished tending the animals in the barn, he followed […] Read more
What’s fairness got to do with it, you ask? – The Moral Economy
THE FRENCH working class really has style. You have to hand them that. When 20 angry workers at the 3M plant in Pithiviers, south of Paris, told director Luc Rousselet that he couldn’t leave until he improved the severance packages for 110 laid off workers, they fed him mussels and fries for dinner. What a […] Read more
So you want to be a moral billionaire? – The Moral Economy
“DO YOU know any billionaires who are moral?” He looked like he could play nose guard for the Hamilton Tiger Cats but he was actually a commerce student at the Mississauga campus of the University of Toronto. We had just finished an interfaith seminar on the economic crisis. “What you’re really asking is whether it […] Read more
What moral values will guide the future? – The Moral Economy
AT THE END of January, Canada’s Parliament will reconvene and the federal government will introduce a new budget. Everyone expects this budget to represent a change in course with a plan to stimulate the economy through tax cuts, infrastructure spending and deficit financing. This represents the new consensus strategy in the world’s largest economies but […] Read more
The need to re-embed the global economy – The Moral Economy
ARE YOU surviving the biggest economic crisis in 75 years? Most of us have been watching from a distance. First it was Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, AIG, HBOS, Fortis Bank and now it’s Iceland, Hungary, Ukraine and Belarus. If these events haven’t yet affected you directly, they will. If you are a farmer, you may […] Read more
Exploring the ethics of economic bail outs – The Moral Economy
THE FINANCIAL crisis is being described as a crisis in the American housing market caused by imprudent lending to homeowners. This is true as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go far enough. The sub-prime mortgage crisis is just the presenting issue. Any number of events could have precipitated this crisis. Rather, the crisis […] Read more
There’s an ethical part to sports excellence – The Moral Economy
WE’VE been hearing a lot about excellence in sport recently and it always gives me an uneasy feeling. What do people really mean by it? It sometimes sounds like this: gold means excellent, bronze is close but not very. I believe in excellence but my excellence includes ethics. I don’t want to rain on the […] Read more
No easy answer to fuel versus food question – The Moral Economy
DO YOU support Bill C33? This is the Canadian legislation requiring biofuel as a percentage of all fuel sold in Canada. The legislation, now before the Senate, allows the government to require up to five percent renewables in all gasoline sold here or up to two percent of all diesel fuel. I was asked this […] Read more
Speculators, investors can have two faces – The Moral Economy
SPECULATORS are never popular. We associate such people with naked greed. They profit from our misery. No one wants to be known as a speculator. An alternative word is investor or risk manager. To be an investor is to have confidence in the future. To be a risk manager is to be prudent and wary. […] Read more
