Last year, the Greens made a push to scrap the tradition of saying the Lord’s Prayer in the upper house.
This year, the Victorian government have pledged to do the same, despite it being a tradition since 1918.
Instead, they want fellow parliamentarians to stand and reflect, say affirmations, or their own version of a prayer.
Reflection has a lot going for it. I meditate from time to time, too.
However, I wonder if parliamentarians would be so keen to scrap the Lord’s Prayer if they knew its true meaning?
Theologians don’t spend much time preaching about economics and vice versa.
Their training is focused on Godly matters of sin, sex, giving to the poor, and so forth…
However, if you’re going to have a conversation about social justice, you cannot avoid the subject of economics. And theology is apparently very concerned with social justice.
As it happens, for almost two centuries, MPs have been standing in parliament and praying, ‘…forgive them their debts’.
Yes — debts, not sins. You’ll see why below.
Debt is a big issue in Australia.
Residents agree.
Many businesses are struggling across Australia with rising debts in a cost-of-living crisis.
No surprise there.
Australia’s household debt, relative to GDP and household income, is the second highest in the world (behind Switzerland).
We also have a much higher share of variable rate mortgages than most other nations — meaning interest rate hikes are passed faster than elsewhere.
It’s a lot of debt, and most of it is held against land.
Debts build up when interest payments are low like they were for the years leading into COVID.
While they remain low, they don’t threaten to destroy the economy.
Real estate buyers are just as focused on how much they pay each month, as well as the upfront cost. And low interest rates drive money into the market.
However, as rates are hiked at the end of the cycle (as we’ve seen through the last year), it is the speed and volume of debt levied against rising land prices eventually brings the pyramid down.
When the cycle reaches its pinnacle, a deep downturn becomes imminent — and inevitable.
According to our timing — you can expect that to happen after a peak in 2026.
The repeating pattern has been going on for a long time.
In the 1st century BC, when the Lord’s Prayer was recorded, debt was also a big issue.
Like today, debts continually rose beyond people’s ability to pay. It led to slave bondage for the debtors and forfeiture of land to the wealthy.
However, the backdrop of economic history in the 1st century was very different from today.
In Sumer and Babylonia, they would forgive the population’s personal debt whenever a new ruler came to power.
It was known as a ‘debt jubilee’. It also occurred when there was a drought, flood, or a similar pressing issue.
In Judaic history, a debt jubilee was held every 50 years.
The ancient economists in the Near East understood that economic growth (at best) follows an S-curve. While interest on loans increases exponentially, something has to give.
Either the economy crashes, or you forgive the debt and wipe the slate clean.
Economist Professor Michael Hudson details the history in his book, …and forgive them their debts.
It’s a fantastic read.
‘Most religious leaders say that Christianity is all about sin, not debt,’ he says. ‘But actually, the word for sin and debt is the same in almost every language.’
As Professor Hudson explains, debt cancellations first appear in the Bible in Leviticus 25.
Jesus’ first sermon announced that he had come to proclaim it.
This interpretation of ‘…and forgive them their debts’ has been all but expunged from our contemporary understanding of the phrase.
The Lord’s Prayer has been changed to ‘…and forgive them their trespasses [or sins]’.
But Jesus was, in fact, preaching an economic lesson that the rulers at the time did not want to hear.
The answer then was no different to now. The only way to free the economy from the financial sector is to write down all the debts!
The only way to prevent the land booms from occurring in the first place is to levy taxes on economic rents (land) — while at the same time removing them from labour and productivity to enable the ‘real economy’ to flourish.
The ancient economists knew this. Consequently, their economies did not boom or bust.
From Hudson again, ‘Today’s world believes in the sanctity of debt. But from Sumer and Babylonia through the Bible, it was debt cancellations that were sacred.’
Our economy has none of the wisdom of the ancient Near East.
There’s no stopping the juggernaut that will carry us through to the end of the cycle. Especially with the focus in parliament firmly on matters that create division rather than unity, such as ‘The Voice’.
Rising rents, housing affordability, a shortage of available dwellings, and record numbers of migrants crossing our shore.
It’s almost the perfect storm for the final two years of this cycle. If we see rates cut (as some have suggested), just imagine what will happen as we rocket into the peak?
You know what’s coming next. That’s the advantage of understanding the drivers behind the land cycle.
Sincerely,
 |
Catherine Cashmore,
Editor, Land Cycle Investor
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