The Moral Limits of Economic Growth
In an erudite book, Harvard economist Benjamin Friedman argues that economic growth does not merely shower its beneficiaries with material goods but is also a moral blessing. Friedman readily acknowledges that his morality is hardly the same as the Christian Right's but has four cornerstones: democracy, mobility, opportunity, and tolerance. Call it liberal. Friedman presents a large variety of historical evidence to support his claim that there is a correlation between economic and moral growth, granting some exceptions, most notably the formation of the liberal New Deal in a period of negative economic growth. In the following pages, I point to a whole slew of important questions that Friedman's analysis brings to mind, and differ with him on several key points. However, I cannot stress enough that the book is full of keen historical, cultural, economic, and social observations and encompasses a large variety of qualitative and some quantitative evidence. Moreover, the hefty volume does return us to a discussion about the moral implications of capitalism and globalization that is far from over. Finally, even those who do not see the historical narrative in quite the ways Friedman does may be delighted to support the progressive social policies he advocates. Friedman grants that liberal advances may occasionally help bolster economic growth; however, in his view, causality runs primarily from economic growth to liberal growth. This preference for economic factors over values as the driving force behind liberalization is reflected in his implicit rejection of Max Weber's thesis that changes in values drive both economic