Good morning!

As we close out the week, I reflect on the high calling of daily labor... and attempts by the cultural elite to shame people out of real work.

But first, here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Friday, September 4, 2020
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UPFRONT: An editing error yesterday on my part left a wrong impression. In fact, U.S. debt is expected – for the first time in modern history – to exceed the size of the economy. (The last time our debt was so high was immediately after World War II.)

• Just how woke are your groceries? The billionaire heir of the H-E-B supermarket chain – San Antonio’s Charles Butt – recently pleaded with the Texas Supreme Court to uphold Harris County’s plan to send mail-ballot applications to all registered voters in the county. He did so in the form of a letter sent on H-E-B letterhead and in the name of his business... and, he claimed, on behalf of everyone who shops at his grocery stores. Brandon Waltens has the story.
      
• “Welcome to H-E-B! Check out our special stolen elections on aisle three, which go nicely with our opposition to low taxes and education reform!”
   
• Despite the family-friendly image of H-E-B, Charles Butt has for years bankrolled efforts against conservatives in the Republican primary and has funded Democrats in general elections.
   
• Fortunately, the Texas Supreme Court sided with the rule of law and didn’t follow Mr. Butt’s anti-voter recommendation.
    
• Liberals do a great job threatening businesses into supporting their leftwing causes. Conservatives tend to fund their opponents by doing business with them.

• Erin Anderson explains why – despite the much celebrated property tax reforms enacted in 2019 – Texans’ property tax burdens are continuing to rise.
      

• The fact is, Texans’ property tax bills are determined by their local officials; they determine the revenue they want to raise, set the rates, and spend the money. To lower Texans’ property tax bills, citizens must demand local officials reduce tax rates enough to offset rising property values and control or reduce spending.
   

• Until then, those tax burdens will continue to rise.

• Citizens in the Metroplex have reason to celebrate... and work harder.
      
• The Democrat-controlled Dallas County Commissioners have scrapped their plans for salary increases that citizens rightly called “inappropriate” while taxpayers suffer from government-ordered shutdowns. Erin Anderson has the details. In the next county over, reports The Texan, the “Republican” Tarrant County Commissioners are set to give themselves a three percent salary increase next week.
     
• Lesson: If citizens want action, we must speak out, loudly and repeatedly, until the politicians have no choice but to listen. 
      
• Meanwhile, the Fort Worth City Council is considering a budget that has lower spending, more police officers, and a smaller property tax increase than last year. Robert Montoya has the details.
       
• “Considering” is the key word. Civic vigilance is the price of liberty for a self-governing people.

Friday Reflection

by Michael Quinn Sullivan

I don’t think I have ever urgently needed someone with a Ph.D. Yet in the cultural economy of the 21st century, we celebrate the pursuit of even meaningless degrees, and dismiss critical professions once known as the trades. The cultural elite would have us believe it is better to be unemployed than do real work that serves others.

We have turned the notion of honorable work upside-down, devaluing practical labor and exalting trivial knowledge. We celebrate someone pursuing an advanced degree at Texas A&M getting a special certification in Gender Studies, but look down on the high school kid who wants to be a mechanic.

Our schools subtly – and sometimes not-so-subtly – communicate to kids that anything less than earning a four-year college degree makes them something less than useful.

As a result, those students find themselves pressured into loading up on unnecessary debt that mainly purchases four years of suffering through indoctrination from leftist college professors.

The free market operates best when people are working at their passions with their naturally gifted skills. Conversely, when individuals are pressured to ignore their skills and talents to appease an elitist mandate, everyone suffers.

Does anyone ever urgently need someone with a graduate-level certification in Gender Studies? Yet we’ve all had moments when we were willing to pay a king’s ransom to get an honest plumber or roofer to the house.

The hostility of the educational and cultural elite, subtly belittling individuals if they don’t seek a college degree, has a devastating effect on individuals and society.

None of this is particularly new; it’s just recycled garbage from the past. The ancient Greeks believed labor was a curse. Aristotle taught it was preferable to be an unemployed beggar, so one could be devoted to contemplation.

The Bible turned such thinking upside down. It begins with the understanding human beings are created in God’s image, and called to practical work. The Old Testament placed a high value on what Aristotle would see as “menial” jobs: Adam and Eve were told to work the land; King David was a shepherd. In the New Testament, Jesus was a carpenter who used the examples of daily work as the springboards for His teaching, rather than subjects to be avoided.

After the old lie reared its ugly head in the Middle Ages, 16th century Christian reformer John Calvin reclaimed the biblical doctrine of the value of work. He held that all work, in all professions, is glorifying to God.

But that elitist Greek lie keeps coming back. Public policy incentivizes young adults to take on massive debt to earn economically – and even socially – meaningless degrees unrelated to the jobs they wish to pursue. We have adopted policies that make it more advantageous to follow Artistole in the handout line, than join the Apostle Paul as a productive tent-maker.

Indeed, Paul was unapologetically clear on the subject in his second letter to the church in Thessalonica: “If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies.”

Many of our social and political problems can be attributed to those idle busybodies. In a republic of sovereign, self-governing citizens, each of us should be about the high calling of productive, daily work.

Real, productive work – meeting real needs – should be celebrated. All work is meaningful, because in our work we serve others with the gifts and skills given to us by God.

If you get a chance, I’d love for you to check out my podcast: Reflections on Life and Liberty. It’s available on all the podcasting platforms. If you like it, subscribe and leave a review. And if you don’t like it, forget I brought it up...