Economic Fallacies: “The Piety Fallacy”

The Piety fallacy is uncritical action based on pietistic interpretations of scripture without regard to actual outcomes resulting from those actions.

This fallacy has a variety of expressions. In the previous post, I pointed to the jubilee code in Leviticus 25 and its use in the debate over debt cancellation and wealth distribution in developing nations. A close reading of the text clarifies that the Jubilee has nothing to do with debt cancellation or wealth redistribution. Some use the early chapters of Acts to make the case that the Bible teaches society-wide communal ownership, which a careful reading doesn’t support. Yet to champion justice for the poor and the oppressed, or to be counter-cultural against perceived mainstream values of materialism, is seen as the pious thing to do. The piety fallacy is usually grounded in genuine good intentions, but the commitment to pious responses takes precedence over critical evaluation of outcomes.   

I’ve borrowed the name for this fallacy from a lecture by Jay Richards in which he used precisely the example I thought of when he described the fallacy. Nearly twenty years ago, I remember reading about the impact of rent controls on housing in an urban economics class. There was a strong correlation between imposing rent controls and the increase in homelessness. Rent controls decreased the amount of affordable housing stock.

If a landlord cannot increase rent and the operations costs continue to rise, then all profitability is eaten up. New apartments aren’t built because developers know they can’t collect enough to make it worth their while. Apartment owners begin converting apartments into condos or non-residential uses. When rent controls have been tried in some major cities, some landlords have actually turned to arson to collect insurance money for the property they can no longer make money on or sell to anyone else. Meanwhile, the available rental housing is decreasing, making what remains more expensive. Tenants with leases don’t relinquish them even after they leave, subleasing apartments to others for what the market will bear. They get the difference between the rent control and market prices that the landlord should have gotten. This makes the rental market even tighter. Yet in nearly all rent control initiatives, pious Christians will support rent control as justice for the homeless even as they deride their opposition as impious heartless people who are callous toward the poor.

Richards offers another provocative example. He notes child labor laws came into effect in the early twentieth century, just as child labor had significantly declined within the workforce. Child labor was essential to family survival not long before this time, as it has been in agriculture throughout history. By the early twentieth century, public education was widespread, and child labor prevented children from engaging in activities that would have greater long-term consequences for them.

Today, as we look at many developing nations, justice folks champion ending all child labor. In many developing nations, half the population or more is under 18 years old. What is often not taken into account is that the alternative to children working is not children going to school for an education. The alternative is prostitution, starvation, or worse. Removing children from the workforce is not practical until basic survival needs are met. This violates our sensibilities, and it is no question far from what we desire for others. Yet uncritically imposing our pious sense of moral judgment on these cultures can do great harm, despite our best intentions. I’m not saying that the ethics with these issues are easy to sort out, but doctrinaire pietism is not the answer.

When judgment day comes, we will no doubt be held accountable for our intentions, but I’m also convinced that we will be held accountable for the use of our discernment. Many economic justice questions require us to balance competing ethical claims against each other and use discernment about what will work or not work. Uncritical pietistic actions can express naiveté, but too often, they are also personal identity statements a person uses to demonstrate their piety in contrast to those they believe are less pious. Biblical justice demands we have pious intentions and truly just outcomes.

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