Economics Schools of Thought

We had family filling the house for Thanksgiving, and that meant time for some conversation about economics with son Economic Sphere. I was wondering about the economics degree of the new, apparently clueless, socialist congresswoman from New York, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Her degree is in economics, and it was my understanding that most notable economics departments had changed in the past few of decades toward free market, and away from Keynesianism. But she seems economically unaware (if I am being kind).

I got this explanation—not recorded, so any errors are mine and not my son’s. Anyway, Economic Sphere said that there are two types of economics programs: those focused on macroeconomics, and those focused on microeconomics. The macroeconomics ones use Keynesian models—despite their being wrong nigh unto 100% of the time. If the model says there will be a particular outcome, they act as though that is the outcome, even after it isn’t, even though sensible people can show why it would never be the outcome.

The ones focused on microeconomics go with free market economic principles. For some reason, they’re more aligned with what actually happens. They’re less willing to interfere, to try to wield power over the economy to get a particular outcome, such as by enforcing pricing, but will instead let the market set prices.

I asked another question, about the difference between the Chicago school (way of thinking) and the Austrian school, since both are free market.

What I got was some basic review. So I thought it might be useful to define a few terms today, and the reasons we prefer what we do--i.e., freedom instead of government interference. While Economic Sphere tends to be a walking encyclopedia, and his answers filter through my explanations below, I've also turned to Wikipedia fairly liberally.

Keynesian Economics

Keynesians, according to my old Webster, “hold that full employment and a stable economy depend on the continued governmental stimulation of spending and investment through adjustment of interest rates and tax rates, deficit financing, etc.” In other words, a healthy economy requires government intervention.

According to Wikipedia,

Keynesian economists generally argue that, as aggregate demand is volatile and unstable, a market economy will often experience inefficient macroeconomic outcomes in the form of economic recessions (when demand is low) and inflation (when demand is high). These can be mitigated by economic policy responses, in particular, monetary policy actions by the central bank and fiscal policy actions by the government, which can help stabilize output over the business cycle. Keynesian economists generally advocate a managed market economy – predominantly private sector, but with an active role for government intervention during recessions and depressions.

One of the first lesson I was taught in a basic econ class, by a free-market economist, was that intervention lags. Legislators—or other officials—look at the current situation, decide it isn’t what they’d like it to be, so they set in motion a policy to change it, that takes about six months, by which time the original situation has changed, and most likely the intervention causes new problems.

Supposedly, the Federal Reserve is there to mitigate and smooth out the damage of cyclical market recessions. What we had before that was occasional volatility. What we’ve had since is occasional volatility plus more regular cyclical recessions. Are the problems all caused by the interventions? We don’t know. And you can’t prove a negative; we don’t have a parallel universe to compare to. But we do know it didn’t do what it set out to do.

Macroeconomics

Macroeconomics is described here by Wikipedia:

Macroeconomics (from the Greek prefix makro- meaning "large" + economics) is a branch of economics dealing with the performance, structure, behavior, and decision-making of an economy as a whole. This includes regional, national, and global economies.

Macroeconomists study aggregated indicators such as GDP, unemployment rates, national income, price indices, and the interrelations among the different sectors of the economy to better understand how the whole economy functions. They also develop models that explain the relationship between such factors as national income, output, consumption, unemployment, inflation, savings, investment, international trade, and international finance.

While macroeconomics is a broad field of study, there are two areas of research that are emblematic of the discipline: the attempt to understand the causes and consequences of short-run fluctuations in national income (the business cycle), and the attempt to understand the determinants of long-run economic growth (increases in national income).

So, macroeconomic models—such as those developed by Keynes—are used by governments to develop policies. But, like I said, interference doesn’t work the way their models say they will. Our Spherical Model saying fits here again: 

Whenever government attempts something beyond the proper role of government (protection of life, liberty, and property), it causes unintended consequences—usually exactly opposite to the stated goals of the interference.

Microeconomics

By comparison, here’s the smaller story of microeconomics, also according to Wikipedia:

Microeconomics (from Greek prefix mikro- meaning "small" + economics) is a branch of economics that studies the behavior of individuals and firms in making decisions regarding the allocation of scarce resources and the interactions among these individuals and firms.

One goal of microeconomics is to analyze the market mechanisms that establish relative prices among goods and services and allocate limited resources among alternative uses. Microeconomics shows conditions under which free markets lead to desirable allocations. It also analyzes market failure, where markets fail to produce efficient results.

Microeconomics stands in contrast to macroeconomics, which involves "the sum total of economic activity, dealing with the issues of growth, inflation, and unemployment and with national policies relating to these issues". Microeconomics also deals with the effects of economic policies (such as changing taxation levels) on the aforementioned aspects of the economy.

In short, microeconomics is what a business would do to figure out how to price a product, and whether to produce the product, based on the price. How well businesses do in predicting price, and allocating limited resources, determines the health of the overall economy. Government interference makes that decision-making process more challenging, adding in tax burdens and other punishments or incentives that distort the actual value of a product.

Free-Market Economics

I looked up both free enterprise and free market in the dictionary.

Free enterprise is “the economic doctrine or practice of permitting private industry to operate under freely competitive conditions with a minimum of governmental control.”

Free market is “any market where buying and selling can be carried on without restrictions as to price, etc.”

So these terms relate mainly to microeconomics. But they are affected by macroeconomic policies, which alter money supply, pricing, taxes, and allocation of resources, distorting information that normally leads to sound pricing and/or production decisions.

I also asked Economic Sphere what is the difference between the Chicago school of economics (i.e., a school of thought, or a set of ideas adhered to by various people—not a physical school) and Austrian, or Mises economics, because they’re both free market. Economic Sphere said the Austrian school of economics is theoretical. It’s about principles and ideas related to the free market. The Chicago school of economics is about policy: how to implement policies as close to the free market as we can get in an imperfect political world.

So, the Austrians tend to be libertarians? I guessed. And he said that was right. Here’s a bit more on those terms.

Austrian School of Economics

I usually hear about the Austrians through the Ludwig von Mises Institute. The originals showed up in Vienna in the late 1800s to early 1900s, although they are all over the world today.

According to Wikipedia,

Among the theoretical contributions of the early years of the Austrian School are the subjective theory of value, marginalism in price theory and the formulation of the economic calculation problem, each of which has become an accepted part of mainstream economics.

Since the mid-20th century, mainstream economists have been critical of the modern day Austrian School and consider its rejection of mathematical modelling, econometrics and macroeconomic analysis to be outside mainstream economics, or "heterodox." Although the Austrian School has been considered heterodox since the late 1930s, it attracted renewed interest in the 1970s after Friedrich Hayek shared the 1974 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and following the 2008 global financial crisis.

I’m assuming that “mainstream economists” from mid-century on refers to Keynesians in this context. Interference was all the rage from about 1910 onward. Keynes and Friedrich Hayek were contemporaries, and Hayek does a good job of refuting the pro-controlled economists with real life. The controllers love their models, and they can’t be bothered with things like real-life evidence and facts.

If Hayek hasn’t been on your reading list, his Road to Serfdom is a must read. Hayek qualifies as an Austrian, but he is also of the Chicago school, because of his influence there. Here’s how Wikipedia describes his contribution:

Friedrich Hayek
image from Wikipedia

Friedrich Hayek (1899–1992) Hayek made contact with many at the University of Chicago in the 1940s, with Hayek's The Road to Serfdom playing a seminal role in transforming how Milton Friedman and others understood how society works. Hayek conducted a number of influential faculty seminars while at the U. of Chicago, and a number of academics worked on research projects sympathetic to some of Hayek's own, such as Aaron Director, who was active in the Chicago School in helping to fund and establish what became the "Law and Society" program in the University of Chicago Law School. Hayek, Frank Knight, Friedman and George Stigler worked together in forming the Mont Pèlerin Society, an international forum for libertarian economists. Hayek and Friedman cooperated in support of the Intercollegiate Society of Individualists, later renamed the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, an American student organisation devoted to libertarian ideas.

Chicago School of Economics

This school of thought got its name because of the work of a number of neoclassical economists on the faculty at the University of Chicago, producing twelve Nobel laureates in economics.

They rejected Keynesianism, and looked at a variety of other ideas for macroeconomics—that is, policy ideas. They’re a little harder to pin down, but in general are trying to apply free market principles to national policy. Bruce Kaufman, in The Elgar Companion to the Chicago School of Economics (2010) says they are characterized by:

A deep commitment to rigorous scholarship and open academic debate, an uncompromising belief in the usefulness and insight of neoclassical price theory, and a normative position that favors and promotes economic liberalism and free markets (p. 133).

The great economist Thomas Sowell studied at the University of Chicago for his PhD—and remained a Marxist throughout. It was later, when real life woke him, that he transformed into a free-market economist.

Milton Friedman
image from Wikipedia

The Chicago name I know best is Milton Friedman, who was at the University of Chicago for some thirty years. According to Wikipedia, again:

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) stands as one of the most influential economists of the late twentieth century. A student of Frank Knight, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1976 for, among other things, A Monetary History of the United States (1963). Friedman argued that the Great Depression had been caused by the Federal Reserve's policies through the 1920s, and worsened in the 1930s. Friedman argued that laissez-faire government policy is more desirable than government intervention in the economy.

One of the critics of the Chicago school, economist and three-term Democrat senator Paul Douglas, complained that, “The opinions of my colleagues would have confined government to the eighteenth-century functions of justice, police, and arms.”

That doesn’t seem like a valid criticism to me; it seems like something to appreciate—limiting government to its proper role. What a concept!

We could summarize today’s economics lesson with this Friedman quote:

One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results.— Milton Friedman Interview with Richard Heffner on The Open Mind (7 December 1975)

Resourceful

Here at the Spherical Model, the world’s smallest think tank, we don’t do a lot of primary research.

What I hope to do is educate, so that more people are equipped with the ideas and principles that lead us to political freedom, economic free market prosperity, and thriving civilization—as alternatives to the historically more common tyranny, poverty, and savagery.

The Spherical Model framework is original, and the opinions are mainly mine. But there are many others interested in freedom, prosperity, and civilization and how we get there.

I thought it might be useful today to share some of the many resources I frequent, in no particular order.

Books

My list keeps growing. There are many that add good information on specific issues or areas of interest. But these few are essential for economics, as well as for understanding the interrelationships of the political, economic, and social spheres:

·         The Road to Serfdom—Friedrich Hayek

·         Basic Economics—Thomas Sowell

·         Economics in One Lesson—Henry Hazlitt

·         Liberal Fascism—Jonah Goldberg

·         The 5000-Year Leap—W. Cleon Skousen

Organizations and Education

These are some of the regular places I turn to, or tune in to:

·         Hillsdale College online courses—These are free, and equivalent to the courses provided to students on campus, if you do the reading and work with it. Or you can just enjoy the lectures and take the quizzes (or not). They just redid their original Constitution class, and I’m looking forward to that. Others include Western Heritage, American Heritage, Economics, Great Books, The Presidency and the Constitution, The Federalist Papers, Winston Churchill, C. S. Lewis, Athens and Sparta, Public Policy, US Supreme Court, and Theology. Each course has 8-10 or so lectures.

·        The Heritage Foundation—This organization has been reliably conservative for decades, some recent leadership changes notwithstanding. They offer news sources, such as the Daily Signal, There’s an activist group called the Sentinels, with a weekly phonecall about current legislative action and online and local support. And they do research and policy work.

·         Hoover Institution—The organization has been around a long time, related to Stanford University, in favor of free market economic policies and prosperity, and other geopolitical issues. Their Uncommon Knowledge, an interview program with authors and experts, is a favorite source. I don’t agree with every interviewee, but it’s a good way to get clarity about their viewpoints.

·         The Witherspoon Institute—This organization does research and education related to the “moral foundations of free and democratic societies.” They’ve come to my attention because of Ryan T. Anderson, their public discourse editor, who is the William E. Simon Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and is one of the clearest voices writing today in defense of marriage. This is scholarly information, and often aimed at advanced college students or professors. But they attempt to write in a way that is accessible, reasonable, and moral.

·         The Ludwig von Mises Institute—This is an organization based on the Austrian school of economics, emphasizing free market policies.

·         Wallbuilders—David Barton is the force behind this organization. They teach history, mainly American history, with the perspective that looks at the necessity of a moral people in maintaining our Constitution. This organization is especially helpful for homeschoolers, which is how I became familiar with it.

·         Texas Home School Coalition—Speaking of homeschooling, THSC is a good resource on education and parental rights issues. While I’m not still homeschooling, I still get their newsletters and rely on them heavily for information during the Texas legislative session.

·         Prager University—A collection of 5-minute videos on a wide array of topics, mainly explaining the conservative (classical liberal) viewpoint. They’re free, and easy to share. And you can login and take a short quiz to test your understanding.

News and Commentary Voices

I don’t spend much time going to main stream media sources. I prefer an admitted bias from someone seeking truth, rather than a claim of unbiased news from sources that are clearly skewed. Still, it’s a good idea to get a variety of views. Often when I use a MSM news source, it is to get more information about an issue I hear about on radio top-of-the-hour news headlines, or stories linked by friends or various sources. This list isn’t exhaustive, or even always views I endorse. And this list changes from time to time. Some I turn to daily or weekly, others only occasionally.

·         Townhall—a daily collection of mostly conservative columnists

·         The Blaze—and various Glenn Beck shows and resources (some parts require subscription fee)

·         The Daily Signal—Heritage Foundation’s daily news source

·         Fox News (if I must go to a traditional source on television) 

·         Hugh Hewitt radio—(archive requires subscription fee)

·         Ben Shapiro and The Daily Wire—the website includes pieces by various writers, but I mainly tune in for Ben Shapiro’s commentary and podcast

·         Thomas Sowell—economist; he has retired from his regular column, but he still writes books and does occasional pieces or interviews

·         Walter Williams—economist; I usually get his columns at Townhall

·         PJ Media—I used to watch their videos, but funding for those ended a year or so ago. I still appreciate, when I find them, Andrew Klavan, Victor Davis Hanson, and others.

·         Matt Walsh—culture blog, found on The Blaze these days

·         Tom Woods—economic and libertarian blog, and good on education issues as well

·         Dennis Prager radio—in addition to the PragerU videos

·         Volokh Conspiracy—legal blog, written by Eugen Volokh and other law professors

·         Greg Mankiw—economic blog by Harvard economics professor

The Quote File

The Political Sphere

I continue to keep a quote file. It’s about the size of a book now, growing since 2010 or so, but I haven’t shared much of it in a while. It’s random. I add on whatever I happen to come across. All the quotes in this collection relate in some way to the Spherical Model—either to political freedom, economic prosperity, or civilization, or sometimes how they interrelate, and sometimes to specific events in the news that relate somehow.

Today’s post isn’t an organized, themed collection of quotes. It’s just the random last few pages, more or less unedited and without comment. Just a glimpse into some of the thoughts accumulated here at the Spherical Model, in hopes they will be enlightening.

Nobody can be a great economist who is only an economist….and I am even tempted to add that the economist who is only an economist is likely to become a nuisance if not a positive danger.—F. A. Hayek

You know, in the oath that brand-new citizens take, it contains six different references to ‘the law.’ If it’s good enough for us to ask brand-new citizens to affirm their devotion to the law, is it too much to ask that the president do the same?—Trey Gowdy, speech before Congress, July 2014

Mr. Speaker, the House of Representatives does not exist to pass ‘suggestions.’ We do not exist to pass ‘ideas.’ We make LAW. And, while you are free to stand and clap when any president comes into this hallowed chamber and promises to ‘do it’ with or without you, I will NEVER stand and clap when ANY president, no matter whether he is your party or mine, promises to  make us a Constitutional anomaly and an afterthought. WE…MAKE…LAW.—Trey Gowdy, (same as above) speech before Congress, July 2014

While not all Muslims or all leftists seek, or support those who seek, Israel’s destruction, virtually all those who do are either Muslim or on the left.—Dennis Prager, “The Genocide Label,” July 29, 2014

Truth withers when freedom dies, however righteous the authority that kills it; and free individualism uninformed by moral value rots at its core.—Frank Meyer

Newark, Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles—and Philadelphia, Cleveland, and a dozen or more other cities—have a great deal in common: They are the places in which the progressive vision of government has reached its fullest expressions. They are the hopeless reality that results from wishful thinking.—Kevin D. Williamson, “Who Lost the Cities?” August 15, 2014

Blacks are only 12 percent of the population in America. But 36 percent of the babies aborted are black. That means that of the more than 3000 babies aborted per day in America over 1000 of them are black.—Mike Adams, “Hands Up! Don’t Abort” 8-25-2014

In the words of one distinguished ambassador, General Carlos Romulo, as he left our shores after serving his government here for nearly a score of years. He said, “I admire and love America…. What I have to say in parting is both a tribute and a warning. Never forget, Americans, that yours is a spiritual country. Yes, I know that you are a practical people. Like others, I have marveled at your factories, your skyscrapers, and your arsenals. But underlying everything else is the fact that America began as a God-loving, God-fearing, God-worshiping people, knowing that there is a spark of the divine in each of us. It is this respect for the dignity of the human spirit which makes America invincible.”

 And this, too, is my tribute to America. We all know that material and physical things are not the source and substance of safety, strength, and freedom of our beloved country."—Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin, General Conference 1976

Improve your community by active participation and service. Remember in your civic responsibility that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” (Edmund Burke). Do something meaningful in defense of your God-given freedom and liberty.—President Ezra Taft Benson, April 1988

Your love of liberty, your respect for the laws, your habits of industry, and your practice of the moral and religious obligations, are the strongest claims to national and individual happiness.—George Washington

Everyone wants to live at the expense of the state. They forget that the state lives at the expense of everyone.—Frederic Bastiat

Men cannot improve a society by setting it to fire: they must seek out its old virtues and bring them back into the light.—Russell Kirk

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.—Thomas Jefferson

A good moral character is the first essential in a man[…] It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous.—George Washington

Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains taken to bring it to light.—George Washington

People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.—Soren Kierkegaard

All the opportunity for self-government through the rule of the people depends upon one single factor. That is the ballot box. . . . The people of our country are sovereign. If they do not vote they abdicate that sovereignty, and they may be entirely sure that if they relinquish it other forces will seize it, and if they fail to govern themselves some other power will rise up to govern them. The choice is always before them, whether they will be slaves or whether they will be free. The only way to be free is to exercise actively and energetically the privileges, and discharge faithfully the duties which make freedom. It is not to be secured by passive resistance. It is the result of energy and action. . . .

Persons who have the right to vote are trustees for the benefit of their country and their countrymen. They have no right to say they do not care. They must care! They have no right to say that whatever the result of the election they can get along. They must remember that their country and their countrymen cannot get along, cannot remain sound, cannot preserve its institutions, cannot protect its citizens, cannot maintain its place in the world, unless those who have the right to vote do sustain and do guide the course of public affairs by the thoughtful exercise of that right on election day.—President Calvin Coolidge

Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy.—Winston Churchill

It is not the business of government to make men virtuous or religious, or to preserve the fool from the consequences of his own folly. Government should be repressive no further than is necessary to secure liberty by protecting the equal rights of each from aggression on the part of others, and the moment governmental prohibitions extend beyond this line they are in danger of defeating the very ends they are intended to serve.—Henry George (1839-1897)

We’ve got a choice. You grow the government economy, or grow the American economy.—Bobby Jindal. Presidential debate October 28, 2015

Long after Barack Obama is gone and ensconced in warm-weather golf-course mansions, the country will remain divided. The them/us splits are the real Obama legacy that tops even his $20 trillion in debt, chronic zero interest rates, a wrecked Middle East, stagnant growth, a hemorrhaging medical system, and record labor non-participation rates.—Victor Davis Hanson, “Community Organizing America,” Nov. 1, 2015

  

We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debt, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our calling and our creeds ... [we will] have no time to think, no means of calling our mis-managers to account but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers....

And this is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for [another] ... till the bulk of society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery.... And the fore-horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and, in its train, wretchedness and oppression.—Thomas Jefferson

Climbing Back Up

Up is the direction we want to go. In the Spherical Model, up is always a good thing: freedom, prosperity, and civilization. We’re experiencing too much tyranny, poverty, and savagery here in our beloved America than we should. And there’s even more of those bottom-of-the-sphere experiences around the world.

Twice now Americans have elected a socialist, anti-American president. Why would Americans do that? Why, when the choice is so stark, do so many not see with clarity enough to make good decisions? I see that solutions are not likely to come from political leaders. Nevertheless, whom we elect matters, because political leaders can do so much to make things worse, if their power is not held to constitutional limits.

Just another everyday mountain meant for climbing, in Utah

So I have been looking for something uplifting—literally and figuratively. One of the optimists I read was Andrew Klavan’s “Klavan on the Culture” post for July 4, 2014, "What I learned on the Trail." Here’s an excerpt:

I am a skilled hiker, but a week or so ago, I made a perilous error. Carelessly neglecting my clear and accurate guide, I mistook a side path for the main trail down the mountain. As I descended along the narrow track, the way became steeper and steeper until, abruptly, it ended at a sheer cliff above a long fall. Short on water, out of breath, weakened by the blistering heat, I looked up and saw my only other option was a dauntingly vertical climb back to the main trail above. My heart misgave me. 

Then three words came into my mind unbidden:  Don’t be afraid. 

I know who speaks those words to me. I said a quick prayer to him for courage and felt myself promptly flooded with the stuff. I began the climb, and though the way was very difficult, and even dangerous once or twice, I was surprised how quickly I found myself back on the main trail, the way home. 

Our country has made a similar error, and equally perilous. We have carelessly neglected our clear and accurate guide to the governance of a free people. We have gone by another way into a steeper and steeper decline. Soon, we will reach a point where the only choice is between a catastrophic fall and a long, hard, upward journey. Our hearts may tell us the climb is impossible. 

Don’t be afraid. 

I had a similar experience many years ago, as a young adult. I was just hiking, not rock climbing, up atop the hill/mountain overlooking the lake where I was camping with my family in the Uintah Mountains. I’d hiked it before and didn’t think it was a dangerous thing to do the hike alone. But I took a different route down, on the face nearest the lake. It wasn’t really a path, but I thought with the lake in view I wouldn’t get lost. But I did get stuck. Suddenly I was unintentionally rock climbing. And suddenly I couldn’t reach a next foothold down. Feeling slightly panicky, I saw that going back up was my only option, because a “catastrophic fall” was the other option. My upper body strength isn’t great, but with a quick prayer, I found a surprising amount of muscle to get myself back up to the last ledge. And from there I breathed away the panic and made my slow way back up to where I could take the more traditional route back to camp. 

The climbing metaphor is so applicable in our country today. So is the source of strength for the “dauntingly vertical climb.”  

That has to be the answer: Turn to God. Pray for courage, strength, and direction. Fearlessly move upward. 

In the Spherical Model, we know that much hinges on individuals and families living civilized, moral lives. Enough do that, and you have a moral, civilized community. Enough communities do that, and you have a moral, civilized state. Enough states do that, and you have a moral, civilized country again. And as we know from our history, a moral, civilized America has a tremendous impact for good in the world. 

Prosperity in the economic sphere is dependent on the morality of the people. Here’s economist Thomas Sowell saying so: 

There are no magic solutions [to getting out of poverty], at least none that I know of. Common sense, common decency, work and honesty are about all I can come up with. These things are not fancy or new or politically correct. But they have a better track record than much that we are doing today.—Thomas Sowell, “Poverty and Snowstorms,” May 20, 2014 

And then you connect the economic sphere to the political sphere, as economist Friedrich Hayek does here: 

To act on the belief that we possess the knowledge and the power which enable us to shape the processes of society entirely to our liking, knowledge which in fact we do not possess, is likely to make us do much harm. . . The recognition of the insuperable limits to his knowledge ought indeed to teach the student of society a lesson in humility, which should guard him against becoming an accomplice in men’s fatal striving to control society—a striving which makes him not only a tyrant over his fellows, but which may well make him the destroyer of a civilization which no brain has designed but which has grown from the free efforts of millions of individuals.—Friedrich Hayek, “The Pretense of Knowledge,” Nobel Prize lecture 1974 

Let’s go full circle and tie the political sphere back into the civilization sphere:

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.—2 Corinthians 3:17

Start upward climb with love of God and family, honesty, obedience to the Ten Commandments. From there add some hard work and ingenuity, and you get prosperity. If you have government to protect your God-given rights and limit government from infringing on them, then you have freedom to build your civilized world.

What we need to do is known, and it’s simple. But it isn’t easy. And in a world that is twisting the meaning of good and evil, right and wrong, it takes courage to do the simple but hard things. But, with God’s help, the climb back up is doable, and not as daunting as it looks from below.

A favorite Mormon hymn, "Come, Come, Ye Saints," gives words of encouragement in a hard journey: "Fresh courage take. Our God will never us forsake." God is up there, in the civilized upper portion of the sphere, reaching to help pull us up. He wants us there—enjoying civilization, prosperity, and freedom.