Article originally posted here by Beacon Wealth

by Beacon Wealth

In an effort to get me out of the house growing up, my dad would often proclaim “Son, an idle mind is the devil’s playground.” This axiom is proving true during the Covid-19 pandemic in a big way. While pornography may not be making national headlines or inflicting physical death, its rise in prevalence during the worldwide shutdown is proving highly destructive to people all around the world.

Providers and distributors of pornography have attempted to seize upon this opportunity to pump up profits and increase viewership during our period of self-isolation and quarantine. As people are alone, bored, and inert, the odds of turning to pornography to fill the void are becoming increasingly high. Pornography companies have made it easier and even more accessible to cultivate this addiction. For example, Pornhub, the largest Internet porn provider, announced it was offering free access to its site along with member privileges to people in Italy, one of the nations most affected by the virus.

As a result of this action, which has also now been extended to both France and Spain, pornography viewership in those countries increased by an average of 50 percent. On March 17, worldwide pornography internet traffic was up 26.4 percent.[1] 

Pornhub declared that these statistics reflected an overall rise in “happiness and distraction” in a period of tragedy and sadness. Is it true that pornography provides joy and a harmless escape from the broken world? Not exactly.

Recovering addicts sing a different tune, with some relapsing after just three weeks of quarantine and others barely avoiding the urge to view pornography again. Why would people fight so hard to avoid going back? It is because pornography is an addiction that is devastatingly harmful to the mental health and emotional and spiritual well-being of millions, not to mention marriages and families.

Not only have studies proven its detrimental effect on mental health and high addiction rate (comparable to that of crack cocaine), pornography sites have also habitually emboldened perpetrators of human trafficking, sexual abuse, and rape. For example, images of a 15-year-old who went missing in Florida for over a year were spotted on Pornhub and other similar websites.[2] While Pornhub touts a proven verification process for ensuring trafficked girls are not appearing in videos on the site, the case in Florida shows this process to be lacking.

This is just one of many examples of pornography providers being complicit in crimes of human trafficking and the denigrating of human dignity. Pornhub may claim they are providing “no strings attached” happiness, but often that happiness is both dangerous to the user’s mental health and comes at the expense and objectification of another human being created in the image of God.

Many major publicly traded companies in the United States facilitate sexual exploitation. The “Dirty Dozen” is a list of twelve companies,  including Amazon, Google, and Netflix, that actively support and profit from pornography addiction and human trafficking.[3]

Friend of Faith Driven Investor, Beacon Wealth Consultants, have a zero-tolerance policy prohibiting investing in companies that profit from pornography. Their LightPoint portfolios seek to invest only in corporations that are making a positive difference in the world. These are what they affectionately call “Shining Light Companies”. These exemplary companies are actively upholding human dignity and promoting human flourishing.

This is not a practice that needs to be singular to Beacon Wealth. If Faith Driven Investors want to act on the message we preach, ensuring that we stay clear of companies that support morally corrupt behavior is a must.

[1] https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/03/coronavirus-lockdowns-porn-companies-see-opportunity-in-isolation/

[2] https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/demonic-deal-pornography-industry-targets-the-isolated-in-coronavirus-pande

[3] https://endsexualexploitation.org/dirtydozen-2020/

by Chris Evans

I recently got an email from Harris, a friend in whose company I’d invested.  After several years of striving mightily to make the venture succeed, he was sharing the news that it had failed.  I was naturally disappointed the investment didn’t pan out, but what really hit me was how hard Harris was taking it.  He was a mature and committed Christian who tried to run the business on Godly principles, but it failed.  I could sense him questioning if he somehow had disappointed God.  With 2/3 of Angel investments ending in a loss, there are probably many faith-driven entrepreneurs who have had to ask this question.  It doesn’t help that in one of Jesus’ most famous parables, the Parable of the Three Stewards, the entrepreneurs in the story are both successful.  I wish sometimes he’d included a fourth steward in this story.   

The parable starts like this: 

“… For it is just like a man about to go on a journey. He called his own servants and entrusted his possessions to them. To one he gave five talents, to another two talents, and to another one talent, depending on each one’s ability. Then he went on a journey. 

It’s clear at this point that the Master only invested in his own servants — people he knew well.  Often times investors start by taking investments from friends and family.  While it hurts to disappoint any investor, often those who trusted you first and know you longest hurt the most.  Also note that the master invested at different levels with different servants. The first received five times what the third did.   Jesus continues…

“Immediately the man who had received five talents went, put them to work, and earned five more. In the same way, the man with two earned two more. But the man who had received one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground, and hid his master’s money. “

Here it’s clear that Jesus respects hard work and initiative.  The first two stewards got to work “immediately”, wanting to show how much they valued the master’s trust in them and eager to show that trust was warranted. 

“After a long time, the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. The man who had received five talents approached presented five more talents, and said, ‘Master, you gave me five talents. See, I’ve earned five more talents.’ “His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You were faithful over a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Share your master’s joy.’ “The man with two talents also approached. He said, ‘Master, you gave me two talents. See, I’ve earned two more talents.’ “His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You were faithful over a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Share your master’s joy.’ 

So far, so good.  Note that the master seemed just as happy with each servant – both will be put in charge of “many things” going forward.  The last servant, however, had a different approach and got a very different response:

“The man who had received one talent also approached and said, ‘Master, I know you. You’re a harsh man, reaping where you haven’t sown and gathering where you haven’t scattered seed. So I was afraid and went off and hid your talent in the ground. See, you have what is yours.’ “His master replied to him, ‘You evil, lazy servant! If you knew that I reap where I haven’t sown and gather where I haven’t scattered, then you should have deposited my money with the bankers, and I would have received my money back with interest when I returned. “ ‘So take the talent from him and give it to the one who has ten talents. Matthew 25:14–29 (CSB)

The last servant didn’t lose his masters money, but did almost nothing with it.  He literally buried it in the ground!  The master calls him evil and lazy.  He’s not so much angry at the return as the lack of effort, imagination, and faith on the servant’s part. 

As an entrepreneur, I love the story of an investor giving servants funds and later praising them for their return on investment, but what about those who try their best to make a return but fail?  Imagine this fourth servant in Jesus Parable that the master gave three talents to:

“… Immediately the man with three talents investing in goods that he shipped to far-away lands growing the investment to thirty talents.”

While the first two servants generated respectable Return on Investment (200%); given a “long-time”  you could probably generate a much higher ROI if you were willing to invest in a riskier enterprise.  However, with greater risk comes a greater chance of failure and in my modified parable the fourth servant learns this the hard way… 

The man was excited to share his results with his master, but then he got word that a storm had sunk all of his ships and his entire investment had been lost.  Right after that, he was told that the master had returned to settle accounts with his servants. 

After the master’s scene with the first three servants, imaging this interaction:

… Then the man with three talents also approached. He said, Master you gave me three talents.  I grew it to thirty talents through shrewd trading but see, all was lost when a storm wrecked the ships carrying the treasure I earned and I have nothing to return to you.”

How do you think the master would respond to this servant? Would he praise him like he did the first two servants, or rebuke him as he did the last?  Failure is a part of entrepreneurship and investing.  We can try our best to avoid failure, but there are always factors and events beyond our control that can wreck our venture (or, for that matter, make them wildly successful).  

I believe Jesus would have had the master say “Well done, good and faithful servant! You were faithful over a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Share your master’s joy.“.   That’s because Jesus’ parable wasn’t really about return on investment, it was about faith.  The difference between the servants that pleased their master and the one that earned the rebuke was that the first two acted on faith, risking what was given to them so that they could put it to work and show their master the fruit of their efforts. The third servant was so afraid of making a mistake and displeasing his master that he had nothing to show for his opportunity – based on Jesus comment about the bankers, even if he’d invested his talent in one of the other servants he would have been praised.  

Faith is so important that when Jesus’ disciples asked him (Jn 6:28-29) “What must we do to be doing the works of God”, Jesus answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent”.  Jesus isn’t really concerned with the quality or quantity of the treasure you are able to bring him – after all he created the treasure in the first place.  What he really wants to know is “did you think, speak, and act like you completely believe that I am who I say I am?”.  The third servant was paralyzed by a fear of failure but what he didn’t see was that the only way he could fail was by being paralyzed by fear – God wanted to see him show faith and take risks. 

This is also reflected in Hebrews (11:6) “Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek him.” The writer then goes on in the rest of chapter 11 to list out those who demonstrate the kind of faith God is looking for.   

So whether you are an entrepreneur launching a company you hope will honor God, an investor hoping God will be pleased with how you use the wealth you’ve been given, ask yourself if you are reflecting your belief in Jesus in your efforts and you can look forward to hearing “Well done, good and faithful servant” regardless of how well your ventures or investments do.  As I wrestle with this question, I try to look past the financial investments I make and also look at how I invest my time in people, being willing to take risks relationally as well as financially and expecting to settle accounts someday with the master who gave me all my days to invest.  

If you are a faith-driven investor, there will be times when you get news as I did from Harris.  While it may be disappointing, if you believe they were faithful and did all they could to make the investment succeed, give encouragement to such faithful entrepreneurs.  This is what I did for Harris. Take time to thank them for all they did to try to make the venture succeed, while reminding them (and yourself) that it is natural and common for new ventures to fail. There is no shame in that sort of failed venture. If you are a faith-driven entrepreneur whose enterprise has come to an end, reassure yourself that, as Phillip Yancy wrote in What’s So Amazing About Grace, there is nothing you can do to make God love you more and nothing you can do to make Him love you less.  If you were not afraid to trust Him in your venture, then you’ve profited from the experience and will be that much more prepared should you choose to start another venture later.  After all,  the master said “You have been faithful over a few things, I will put you in charge of many things.”

Article originally posted here by Eventide

by Shaun Morgan

From its inception in 1602 with the creation of the Dutch East India Company, the democratization of investing has profoundly impacted our world.

Ordinary people, responsible for leveraging the powerful force of investing, can change the world for the better. But investing for the common good will only succeed if those ordinary people recognize and accept the responsibility.

Read more about the ways in which investing has been used to shape businesses to effect positive change in the world and the types of questions we should be asking to recapture the original purpose of investing.

by Shane Enete

Oblivious to Risk

I once had a student who came into my office. He eagerly declared, “I want to invest in stocks!” I asked him why. He said, “my roommates are all making so much money. I want in. They bought AMC at $10 and it is now $50!” 

One important marker that separates a beginning investor from a more mature investor is their understanding of risk. Beginner investors, who have often been regaled by tales of easy money, rarely consider risk properly. 

But, what does it mean to properly consider risk?

But, what does it mean to properly consider risk?

Calculating Risk

The traditional way to consider risk is to simply calculate it. When calculating risk, most investors use a statistical measure of dispersion around a historical average, such as standard deviation, volatility, beta, or downside deviation. 

For example, if I had a stock that has historically returned 10% per year, with a 20% standard deviation, then 95% of the time, the stock is predicted to create a return that is between -30% and +50% (i.e., 2 standard deviations +/- the average return). The higher the standard deviation, the more potential that the investment deviate far from its average return. 

Once the preferred measure of risk is calculated, then an investor is considered “grown up” if they then seek to maximize their risk-adjusted returns. A common way to measure risk-adjusted returns is to use the Sharpe ratio, which, essentially, takes the expected return of an investment and divides it by a measure of risk. The higher the Sharpe ratio, the more return you are getting given the same amount of risk. 

There is more to Risk

So, is that it? Is considering risk properly simply a matter of calculating risk-adjusted returns? 

In business school, and the industry, I have never been satisfied to stop at risk-adjusted returns. I have always felt like there is something more that needs to be considered. What if risk is not just a matter of the head, but also of the heart? Put another way, what if risk actually has the potential to form us as people? 

If this is true, to properly consider risk, we would not to both calculate it (i.e. “head”) and consider how it may form us (i.e., “heart”). 

To properly consider risk, we would not to both calculate it (i.e. “head”) and consider how it may form us (i.e., “heart).

When I was 15, I bought my first stock. It was 1995 and just about every stock went up during this time period. I bought the stock, and instantly made money, and it felt really, really good. This really good feeling is dopamine. The more extreme the markets got, the more chances there were for big hits of dopamine. 

I began to like risk since it meant the chance for big wins. The more I engaged, the more my personality began to gradually shift. Before investing, I was a normal “risk avoiding” individual. After all of the fun of investing, I was forming into a “risk seeking” individual. My brain loved the dopamine and I knew that seeking out risk was the way to get more of it. 

Numerous studies have shown how the brain changes when receiving regular doses of dopamine. In one study entitled, “Dopamine Agonist Increases Risk Taking but Blunts Reward-Related Brain Activity,” scientists discovered that the actual brain was altered when participants were given regular doses of dopamine versus a control group (doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0002479). See picture below of the altered dopamine brain.

The more risk, the more opportunities there are for intense doses of dopamine. This then has potential to form us into risk-seeking individuals. Another name for “risk-seeking individual” is gambler. Gambling addiction has been described by some psychologists as the hardest addiction to overcome. From the beginning of civilization, gambling has devasted families in its wake.

The riskier markets get, the more opportunities there are for intense doses of dopamine.

There is a scene in Rat Race that epitomizes how risk has the potential to rewire you from a fruitful, risk averse individual into a more destructive, risk-seeking individual. The movie is centered around the idea of taking a handful of random strangers, placing a million dollars in a duffle bag a few hundred miles away, and then betting on which stranger will get to the money first. As the strangers engage in a “rat race,” the most interesting scene to me is when the rich gamblers begin to gamble on all sorts of other random things, from climbing curtains, to how hotel staff would respond to certain questions. For the rich gamblers, the thrill of the race was not enough dopamine for them – they needed more, and more, and more. Having a risk-seeking brain means you are constantly seeking out dopamine and it is a spiral that leads towards more and more addictive behavior. 

This Rat Race scene is being replayed in today’s culture. 

Easy gains during the last 10+ years have led to a generation of risk-seeking investors who usually begin with stocks, then move to more risky crypto investments, and then, finally end up in the completely untamed NFT/metaverse markets where a picture of a snail pooping a rainbow is valued at a million dollars. 

Easy gains during the last 10+ years have led to a generation of risk-seeking investors.

This is not the only way that the experience of risk has the potential to form you as an individual. 

When my wife bought a town house in 2007, as a single gal, she mainly did it because everyone said you need to do it. Real estate was supposed to be a “sure thing.” Within months, her property was severely under-water. The experience changed her to become very fearful of any type of risk. This re-wiring of the brain to over-assess risk is a much deeper level than just financial education. For many people, the experience of the real estate and stock market drops in 2008 were enough to keep them out of these markets when it was actually the best possible time to engage them. 

So, in order to properly consider risk, we must:

1. Determine an appropriate way to calculate the risk of any investment we are considering.

2. Consider how we will experience that risk and whether the experience of the risk will change us as people.

For any investment, if the risk cannot be calculated (I’m looking at you crypto and NFTs) – it is likely a very bad idea. I know that if I were to invest in things where I would not be able to calculate the risk, all of my deep-formed convictions about investing would be broken. This would change me into a person I do not want to be. 

Whenever my students ask me about investing in Bitcoin, I like to ask them, “will it change you?” Assuming the best-case scenario, and you make lots of money without understanding the risk, will you change as a person? 

If you ask anyone whether they will become a worse person for winning the lottery, every single person will deny that they will change. But studies have shown that, for most people, winning the lottery fundamentally changes them into a less satisfied, more addictive people. 

Risk forms us. 

Whenever my students ask me about investing in Bitcoin, I like to ask them, “will it change you?”

A few tips to avoid having risk form us the wrong way:

• Fear risk – demand to know the risk of something before you invest. If you don’t know why something goes up, or down, then you are likely engaged in risk-seeking, gambling behavior. 

• Once you buy something, consider owning it for 10-20 years, and only check its price once-a-month or, perhaps twice a year. This will lead to less intense signals to your brain and reinforce a long-term perspective. In other words, it’s boring, and boring is good for the heart and mind.

There are thousands and thousands of boring investors who simply bought and held a diversified portfolio of stocks, and became financially healthy. There are also thousands and thousands of people who sought out quick riches and are bankrupt both financially and emotionally. In fact, this road to destruction is so well-worn that the Bible has clear warnings about it:

“Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.” 1 Timothy 6:9

Avoid financial short-cuts – chasing after get-rich-quick schemes is often just veiled greed.  

 “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” Luke 12:15

In the end, I recommend that you be like my Nana, who bought a boring portfolio of high-quality stocks, and then forgot about them until her retirement. This boring way gave her what she needed, when she needed it, without putting her heart at risk. 

by Andre Mann

Over the past decade, one of the topics that has consumed the American news cycle and political debate is what to do about immigration. Do we build a higher wall? Do we give amnesty to undocumented workers? Do we increase the number of temporary work visas? Do we reduce the number of refugees? Do we close all borders to keep out COVID?  

Regardless of which side of each of these questions you are on, almost everyone agrees that the current system is broken. Thousands of unaccompanied minors stream across the border each month, placing themselves at the mercy of strangers along the way. Eleven million people without legal documentation live and work in the shadows of our society. Businesses in the tech space and farmers across America are unable to grow at the pace their customers would like or pick the fruit for domestic and foreign consumption because they cannot find sufficient workers, even in the economic downturn during the pandemic. Immigration judges delay seeing asylum cases for years because the number of judges is too low. All of this is unsustainable. The system can no longer ignore the fact that things are not working. The human and economic cost of doing nothing far outweighs the need to find a solution that protects our communities and reflects the values of our society.

In this paper, I will propose that there is both an economic and a spiritual reason to be pro-immigrant. Although I will not advocate for specific pieces of legislation, nor will I advocate for the solutions of one political party or another, I will highlight the work of the Evangelical Immigration Table and offer the solution of restitution-based immigration reform that is based on clear biblical principles, a respect for the rule of law, and a belief that the continued economic vibrancy of the country depends on a just immigration system with high walls and wide gates.

A Demographic and Economic Reckoning

The United States is facing a demographic reckoning. The birth rate has continued to decline, and the fertility rate has reached 1.6 children per woman, down from 2.1 children in 2008. This rate is below population replacement level, meaning the US population will decline if current trends persist. After remaining largely stable over the previous 20 years, in 2005, the old-age dependency ratio (the percent of people who are retired compared to the productive working age population) began to rise from 18% in 2005 to 25% in 2015.  

This trend will continue to rise over the coming decades reaching 40% of the working age population by 2050. Why does this matter?

Tax revenue to cover annual expenses for Social Security entered into a deficit in 2016, meaning that at current trends, the Social Security Trust Fund will be depleted sometime between 2030 and 2040. (Scenarios II and III, below) We face the following three options: 1) Taxes will go up for people in the workforce, 2) Benefits will go down for retirees, or 3) We must increase the number of people in the workforce. The trends are dramatic enough that we will likely require action on all three fronts (Scenario I). But the bottom line is, our economy requires additional workers so that they can pay Social Security and income taxes in order to maintain the current productive, retirement infrastructure into the next generation. 

Ali Noorani and Danilo Zak make a powerful economic and demographic argument for increased immigration in their February 2021 paper with the National Immigration Forum, titled Room to Grow: Setting Immigration Levels in a Changing America. They show that even a relatively modest increase in total legal immigration to 4.3 immigrants per 1000 people (in line with the historic average from 1820-2000; an increase of 340,000 people per year vs. current trends) would make a significantly positive impact to the demographic and economic future of the country. 

In parallel, from a religious standpoint, immigrants bring fresh vibrancy to the church in the United States. At a time when church affiliation is declining precipitously (only 56% of millennials consider themselves Christian, down from over 70% just a few years ago), over 68% of immigrants call themselves Christian. Latinos are the largest immigrant group in the United States, and one fourth of them consider themselves Evangelical/Protestant. In New York City, there are over 150 African immigrant congregations, and 44% of all Asian Americans are Christian. The face of Christianity in America is changing, and one of the major reasons denomination after denomination continues to see new churches planted is thanks to immigrant communities. If it weren’t for these first and second-generation American Christians, one has to wonder what the future of the evangelical church would be in the United States.

Principles that Should Guide our Immigration Policies

So, what should the church attitude toward immigrants be? The Evangelical Immigration Table has outlined six principles that should guide our thinking on the topic. 

1. Upholding the God-Given Dignity of Every Person. God made each person in His own image (Genesis 1:26-27). He further, in over 73 passages, instructed Israel to treat the foreigners in their midst with the same measure of justice as its own people. There is a recognition that foreigners are usually oppressed, but Israel should remember that they were once foreigners in Egypt. As such, Israel should treat refugees the same as the poor, widows, and orphans—with mercy and charity. Jesus acted quite counter-culturally when he related with foreigners in a way that upholds the dignity of the person, not only with the Samaritan woman (John 4) but also in numerous other examples (the centurion, the Canaanite woman, the Gerasene man).
   The national myth we tell ourselves about what makes our country exceptional includes an understanding that many of the earliest settlers came fleeing persecution and that America was the land that offered the poorest, most desperate people an opportunity no other place on earth could offer. The wealthiest country that history has ever seen, with over 328MM people, was born out of the hard work of immigrants, who came together to build a society that welcomed others. Even as we recognize that tremendous injustices occurred along the way, with slavery and the expulsion of Native Americans from their lands, we can also recognize that our country would not be what it is if it had not welcomed immigrants the way it did. A large part of that welcoming was built on this understanding that, no matter where you are from, God has given each person inherent dignity, even if at certain points in time, we have failed to fully extend those privileges to everyone.

2. Respect for the Rule of Law. God placed governing authorities to protect the members of the society and to be instruments of justice for everyone. Romans 13:1 states, “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” A society that does not respect the rule of law becomes a land of lawless anarchy. Those who break the law must in some way pay restitution to society, whether through fines or jail time, depending on the severity of the infraction and any mitigating or aggravating factors such as motivation. Crossing the border without documentation is a misdemeanor, and while overstaying a visa is not a federal crime, it does break administrative rules. Restitution should match the level of offense committed.

     

3. Ensuring Fairness to Taxpayers. American workers and corporations pay taxes to cover the costs of government services both at the local level and at the national level. In exchange, our communities derive all kinds of benefits from governmental expenditure including streets and highways, national defense, public education (including state-funded university systems), crime prevention, social security, unemployment insurance, etc. Because of the way taxes are collected from each person’s paycheck, immigrants, whether legal or undocumented, also pay their share of taxes, but undocumented workers and their families do not receive many of the benefits citizens and legal immigrants do.  
   It is a common misconception that undocumented workers do not pay taxes.   Statistically, about half are having taxes deducted from their paychecks, and many others are using their Individual Tax Identification Number (ITIN) to pay and file their taxes.   On the net – taking into account federal, state and local taxes – immigrants (including those who are undocumented) contribute more in taxes than they receive in benefits. The National Immigration Forum’s study on Immigrants as Contributors, Immigrant Tax Contribution and Spending Power indicates that if our country were to expel undocumented immigrants, it would cause a tremendous negative economic shock to our economy that would hurt the rest of the country across the board.

4. Protecting the Unity of the Family. Immigration policies should preserve the God-given institution of marriage. Since families are the basic building block of our society, we should preserve the unity of the family. This is compassionate, and it brings stability to communities. Because of this, family reunification should continue to be an important part of immigration policy.

5. Guarantee Secure National Borders. The first and foremost responsibility of the national government is to provide security to its citizens. An unguarded border not only allows for hostile countries to attack the country but also opens the country up to threats from criminal, non-state actors. Although our country has made great strides in securing the border, much remains to be done. Specifically, over half of undocumented workers in the US arrive by air with short-term visas that are allowed to expire. Currently, there is no system in place to track if/when any visitor to the US leaves the country since we are one of the few countries on earth that does not register departures. This lack of border enforcement, both at the actual border and through airports, is used by smuggling gangs to move people and drugs into the US and guns and illegally generated cash out of the US. This has fueled the regional instability in Mexico and Central America, creating a humanitarian disaster that fuels a mass migration northward as people seek safety for their families and opportunities to thrive without fear of kidnapping and extortion at the hands of the criminal gangs.

   Further, because our asylum system is so underfunded, we create a perverse incentive for massive amounts of people to attempt to cross the border illegally. Since it can take years to be seen by an immigration judge, and many applicants are able to live in the US while they wait for their days in court, we create a magnet even for those with marginal asylum claims to use this system to illegally cross the border and then apply for asylum. Even if their asylum claim is eventually denied, they have been able to live and work in the US for many years. Unfortunately, by then, many have established roots in the country, have US-born children or spouses, have established careers, etc. We, then, find ourselves in a situation where it would be unjust to rip families apart and would be damaging to our economy to deport long-established workers.  

   A better system would allow for a strong border (including airports), documentation of departures, quick enforcement of immigration laws when someone overstays his/her visa, and an efficient and well-funded asylum process staffed with the right amounts of judges and support staff to adjudicate those cases with legitimate asylum claims in line with current laws and international treaties, while promptly deporting those who do not meet the criteria for asylum.  

6. Establishing a Path Toward Legal Status. Currently, there are approximately 11 million people living in the US without legal documentation. Some of them, such as asylum seekers and individuals with Temporary Protected Status (TPS), are legally allowed to be here until their situations are resolved. Dreamers are young people who were brought here illegally as children (and hence, as minors, had no legal competence to decide to break the law or not regarding their legal status—many didn’t find out they weren’t American until they turned 18 and couldn’t go to college). For most of them, the United States is the only home they have ever known. Others, who came as adults, have long-ago established deep roots in the community. Sixty-six percent of undocumented immigrants have been in the US for over 10 years. They have paid their taxes; many have married and had children. Some have started businesses that employ many others.  

The idea of a mass deportation of 11 million people is unfathomable. Firstly, a police state would need to be established to check documents of all Americans. (To avoid racial profiling, anyone could be asked for documentation at any time.) Large scale raids at workplaces, farms, and processing plants would create chaos for businesses. Criminal gangs would prosper since undocumented workers would come to depend on their powerful infrastructure to keep their families from being caught up in immigration raids. Massive concentration camps would be required to hold the hundreds of thousands of people scheduled for deportation, and thousands of judges would be needed to sift through cases, as wrongly detained Americans press their cases to not be deported.  According to the conservative advocacy group, American Action Forum, it would cost $400-600 billion and take two decades, shrinking US GDP by 6% over that period of time, versus not deporting the undocumented workers. For perspective, the US economy shrank by 3.5% in 2020 due to COVID, the largest decline in 74 years. Mass deportation is not only disruptive for the millions of families who have undocumented members (who, by the way, are overwhelmingly Christian), but it would also be devastating economically for the country as a whole.

Mass amnesty has the advantage of regularizing the legal status for millions of people living in the shadows. They would be able to apply for driver’s licenses, get car and home insurance, apply for mortgages, and save for retirement. This benefits all of us, since they would no longer fear drawing attention to themselves when they report crime, would actually have insurance if they get into a car accident, and would not burden hospitals with unpaid bills since they would have access to health insurance. 

On the other hand, an amnesty like this would ignore that laws were broken and would violate the biblical principle of respect for the rule of law. It may create an incentive for further waves of undocumented workers to continue crossing the border, in the hope that they too will benefit from periodic amnesties. Criminal gangs would be strengthened as increasing numbers of immigrants would rely on their human smuggling operations in order to position themselves for future amnesties. Amnesty would be unjust to the millions of refugees worldwide who are fleeing persecution yet who have to wait in line until they are able to resettle in a safe place. Amnesty may solve the issue immediately at hand of figuring out how to deal with 11 million people currently without documentation, but it actually creates a bigger future problem as the US draws even more people outside the legal migratory system.

Restitution-Based Immigration Reform

The solution is Restitution-Based Immigration Reform. God delights in redemption. But in a legal system, redemption first requires admission of guilt and restitution. In the case of the undocumented, restitution by those seeking to remain permanently in the U.S. could, among other appropriate requirements, show that they have not committed any serious crimes, require that they pay a significant fine as a penalty for having overstayed their visa or crossed into the U.S. unlawfully, and demonstrate that they have paid all their taxes. This, combined with a system that increases the number of legal visas available so that families can be reunified legally and so that the US economy can have access to a growing, productive workforce, allows the US government to take control over immigration from the criminal gangs that control significant parts of the process now.  

We need to pass a series of laws to reform completely our immigration system. We should start with Dreamers—74% of Americans support legal status for immigrants brought to the US illegally as children. Then, increasing protections at the border and other ports of entry, requiring all employers to e-verify immigration status, and funding the needed infrastructure for processing asylum seekers can all easily pass on a bipartisan basis.  Subsequently, Congress can tackle Temporary Protected Status, simplifying and reforming the process for farmworkers, skilled workers, and children separated from their families through bipartisan negotiations, to build a just and fair immigration system. 

This revised immigration system will result in swift, efficient, and just adjudication of asylum claims, strong border protections, and visa solutions to meet the farm, tech, and skilled worker needs of the US economy. Coupled with a generous refugee policy that brings in a significant number of the most vulnerable people fleeing conflict and persecution, the US can set itself up for economic growth into the next generation. A high wall with a wide gate is the best path forward for the vibrancy of our country both from an economic standpoint as well as from a Kingdom mindset.

Article originally hosted and shared with permission by The Christian Economic Forum, a global network of leaders who join together to collaborate and introduce strategic ideas for the spread of God’s economic principles and the goodness of Jesus Christ. This article was from a collection of White Papers compiled for attendees of the CEF’s Global Event.

by Jerome Garciano

On this week’s podcast, we talked to Jerome Garciano and Jeff Shafer about Opportunity Zones. Recently, Jerome wrote a whitepaper that was influential in the OZ legislation that will help you better understand the what, why, and how of opportunity zones. 

As Faith Driven Investors, it’s important to understand how these programs work—specifically tax treatment of realized gains and OZ asset gains. Oftentimes investors wrestle with OZs on two levels: investment and the OZ wrapper. For clarity Jerome has provided three overarching questions to help guide investors. 

These resources are below and for more information, listen to The Land of OZ podcast here.