Nobel Prize for Economics

This morning my husband read to me from an article on the awarding of the Nobel prize for economics to two Americans. I was interested to learn that these two prize-winners' research goes against the conventional wisdom about how economic decisions are made and their effectiveness. It seems that the decisions of non-profit entities will tend to be just as efficient and effective as those of private for-profit enterprises if the decisions are modeled within a game-theory framework. That says to me, if it is understood that organizations can learn.

So what does this have to do with prayer? Well, it has been increasingly clear to me lately that the media reports about the economics of capitalism and super-capitalism have been missing some important pieces. How can "improvements" in health care and health care insurance result in such miserable outcomes compared to other industrialized countries? How can successful agricultural efforts result in bottomed out "rewards" for the farmers who produce the world's food? How can we not factor in the well-being of people when we discuss economics?

The kin-dom of heaven is not based in a monetary system. May we find ways to assess economic systems against the well-being of the human communities and the health of the natural world matrix in we all live. May we end an idolatrous worship of profits over people and planet. Amen.