The Moral Order of Panera

It seems to me that the author misunderstands the nature of the libertarian moral-economic approach. The whole point of it is that whatever decisions people make wrt charity and welfare with their own money are the only ones that reflect their true morality, and thus, a free market will simply express the moral consensus of the society in which it operates. Thus, if the experiment supports the theory that "consumers don’t prefer conscious capitalist businesses", from that perspective, it is not a failure - it just means that the current consensus is that the various social causes aren't important enough to pay for them.

That is also why people who subscribe to this value system wouldn't talk about SNAP - from their perspective, it's some people deciding what to do with other people's money, which cannot be moral by definition.

You may disagree with that value system and its definitions - I do - but you have to at least acknowledge that it is different enough that what you see as problems is not necessarily what its adherents see as problems. In this case, the article writer is complaining at the end that it's a failed attempt at "solution to a problem we already know how to solve" - but is it really meant to solve that problem? I don't think so.

We all collectively benefit when children get a good education, when everyone has fast and safe transportation, when everyone has enough nutritious food, and when healthcare is available to all.

These collective goods must be paid for collectively, or the free-rider problem guarantees failure.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-rider_problem

I will gladly pay my share to secure these social goods, but I won't shoulder the entire burden by myself.

When I see most people free riding, I'm much less likely to step up and be the chump who contributes.

> These collective goods must be paid for collectively, or the free-rider problem guarantees failure.

That’s close to the truth, but it ignores the efficacy of charities and churches — where many people can (and do) give generously to help others. When run well, those do far more good than even government programs.

I challenge anyone who cares about the poor and wants to make a big difference to give to, volunteer at, or even start one of these nonprofit community programs.

In my city there’s a charity that provides clothes to poor people at massive discounts. They don’t feel like they’re getting a handout, since they’re still paying (less than $1 per item) - hence they don’t lose any sense of dignity or “providing for their family”. It also reduces free-loading since you do have to pay. And store employees take time to help people with all sorts of things - job applications, government forms. If I’m bit mistaken, they also offer counseling, showers, and a cold weather shelter.

So, I can totally believe that this particular idea didn't work well. I can totally agree that we should learn from it, perhaps that people want to give $ to feed the poor only when they don't have to sit next to them, or that people on lunch break don't want to have to tackle a moral quandary just then.

But, the article seemed needlessly negative. So, the CEO of Panera tried something, put his business experience to work seeing if this idea would succeed, and when it didn't, after giving it a fair shot, he shut it down. I don't think that's a reason to hate on him for trying it, or that anyone who thought it was worth a try should have known better. Just a reason for solving hunger in a different way (perhaps the simpler one of just giving food-insecure people some lunch money).

The thing is, charities and churches are rarely "run well". Many charities have become a cash cow for their executives and office staff (“Hey, look, we can direct a lot of these donations to paying us extremely generous salaries”), with actual generosity to those in need almost seeming an afterthought. I saw this firsthand when I volunteered in the central office of a charity, and it rather shattered my idealism.

Churches have been notorious for either stipulating that recipients act in a certain church-approved way to get aid, or giving charity in the hope that recipients will convert. Either way, it hardly strikes most people outside that religion as "generous".

It is worth pointing to the Nordic countries, where private charitable endeavours have largely faded away with the rise of the welfare state, and even the local churches are happy to let the state take care of the feeding, clothing and housing business because the state enjoys economy of scale far beyond any church’s ability. In spite of the dwindling of private charity, those countries have less wealth disparity than countries fond of charitable activity. Consequently, some feel that charity is a just an awkward substitute for a functional state, not a good thing in itself.