Cedarville Magazine, Spring 2013

Cedarville Magazine | 13 I even had a killer statistic I knew would end this argument once and for all: “Do you know that America has the second- highest corporate tax rate among the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)?” Silence. Then my sister-in-law spoke up. “I read an article in The Seattle Times about a little girl who lives with her mother in a car. What is your precious free enterprise system going to do for her ?” I am the President of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a Washington, D.C., think tank dedicated to public policy, and I lost the argument . Later that night I complained tomy wife, “I just don’t understand my family. I’ve got all the facts and figures, but they just don’t want to listen.” She wisely answered, “Think about it. You’re talking about OECD tax rates, and they’re talking about a girl who lives in a car. What matters more, money or people?” “I’m a Christian,” I said. “Of course people matter more than money.” “Thenmaybe,” she said, “ you should start talking about people instead of money .” A light bulb went off. That’s what we’re doing wrong. Liberals, moderates, conservatives, socialists ... everyone agrees that capitalism generates the most wealth, but it doesn’t tell us what makes the best life. Until we can make the moral case for capitalism, we will continue to lose. The Heart of the Matter Conservatives believe that if we could just present enough PowerPoint charts on fiscal consolidation, unemployment rates, fiscal cliffs, and the disaster that will befall us if we become like Greece, then the American public will realize that (ding!) free enterprise is best, and we’ll revert back to the ideas of our founders. My computer’s hard drive is full of this sort of data, but data is not getting the job done. We’re not nourished entirely by material facts. The moral case beats thematerial case every time. Jonathan Haidt, best-selling author of The Righteous Mind , is the world’s leading expert on moral judgment and how it is processed by the human brain. He showed me an experiment he does with human subjects. He tells them a little story that turns into a moral dilemma: There is a family with three young children who want a dog. Their begging and pleading is ultimately successful when Mom and Dad cave and buy the children a puppy. They name her Muffin, and she turns out to be a great dog— fantastic with the children, never bites the mailman, shows up in all the family Christmas photos. One day, the youngest child accidentally leaves the front door open. Muffin runs outside and chases a squirrel into the street. Within seconds, she is hit by a car and killed in front of the whole family. The children are screaming, Mom is in tears, and even Dad is choked up. He goes out to the street and carries Muffin’s lifeless body back to the house. Together as a family, they lovingly decide to cook the dog and eat her. Your brain is saying, “That story sure ended wrong.” In your medial prefrontal cortex, the part of your brain right behind your forehead, you are experiencing something calledmoral repugnance. I could say, “But the dog was already dead. It’s a high-quality protein source. Why not eat the dog?” You’d say, “It’s just ... wrong.” You’ve made a moral judgment that needs no justification. I could try to displace it with other material arguments, but it wouldn’t work. Today, tomorrow, or next week, my rational arguments will still be meaningless. It’s just wrong to eat your pet. While I went on about OECD tax rates atThanksgiving, everyone else around the table was concerned about the girl and her mother living in a car. In any debate, you have 10 seconds to make your case. You can waste your 10 seconds talking about money, or you can talk about what’s written on your heart. The Pursuit of Happiness TheDeclarationof Independence contains a profoundmoral covenant from our founders to you: we are “endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness .” You’re not promised property, wealth, ormaterial prosperity, but what you are promised is even more remarkable. I wanted to know what pursuing happiness means in our lives today. I researched and wrote a book called Gross National Happiness . I can tell you who are happier —men or women, atheists or people of faith, Republicans or Democrats. I was fascinated to learn the unhappiest average age in a man’s life is 45 years old. Is 45 when your wife finally realizes you’re boring? Is it the misery induced by having a teenager in the house? Perhaps, but these explanations are not complete. About half of men get to 45 and realize they’ve missed what they really wanted in life. When you’re in your 20s and 30s in America, the strategy for life is easy. Life is a superhighway, and the signs say “dollars.” You want to succeed and be prosperous? Hit the gas, go harder. About half of men, according to the data, stop at 45 and say, “I think I missed my exit. There’s something back there that I wanted. I don’t know what it is, but I know it isn’t this .” What is down that little road if you happen to find the exit? I know the answer because I’ve got the data. It’s a phenomenon called earned success, which comes from creating value with your life and in the lives of other people. “ Then maybe you should start talking about people instead of money.”