Postpone Your Pleasures
... and enjoy them all the more.
My father-in-law, with whom I was very close, spent most of his life on the same working-class street in Barcelona’s El Clot neighborhood. Born in 1929, he saw Spain’s bloody civil war taking place literally in front of his house. His family experienced a lot of suffering. Some died; others spent years in jail or were forced into exile. He himself spent a year in a refugee camp, an experience that affected him for the rest of his life. Every time he wanted to make a point about society or culture, he always started with: “Well, during the civil war …”
Continue reading the entire piece here at The Atlantic (paywall)
Arthur C. Brooks is a distinguished fellow at the Civitas Institute. He is the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Public and Nonprofit Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and professor of management practice at Harvard Business School, where he teaches courses on leadership, happiness, and social entrepreneurship. He was president of the American Enterprise Institute from 2009 to 2019.
Pursuit of Happiness
The Rise of Latino America
In The Rise of Latino America, Hernandez & Kotkin argue that Latinos, who are projected to become America’s largest ethnic group, are a dynamic force shaping the nation’s demographic, economic, and cultural future. Far from being a marginalized group defined by oppression, Latinos are integral to America’s story. They drive economic growth, cultural evolution, and workforce vitality. Challenges, however, including poverty, educational disparities, and restrictive policies, threaten their upward mobility. Policymakers who wish to harness Latino potential to ensure national prosperity and resilience should adopt policies that prioritize affordability, safety, and economic opportunity over ideological constraints.
Exodus: Affordability Crisis Sends Americans Packing From Big Cities
The first in a two-part series about the Great Dispersion of Americans across the country.
The Quintessential American: Ben Franklin, Man of All Ages
Franklin’s prudence is as welcome 320 years on as his legendary serenity.
The Moral Case for America in a Nutshell
America’s proponents now have no choice but to articulate their own simple and effective moral case for our way of life.
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The Wealth of Nations at 250: Adam Smith’s Blueprint for the American Economy
Ideas of few books have shaped the economic logic of the American experiment more profoundly than The Wealth of Nations, even when Americans have not always realized it as an agent that promotes prosperity and reduces poverty.
