
Economic analysis of religion: The Invisible Hand of God - kalvin
http://www.slate.com/id/2206116/
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tokenadult
This is a good analysis of one specific example of the more general point that
religious pluralism in a country tends to result in more active participation
in religion. American evangelical Christians are sometimes puzzled by why
European Christians seem to have so little involvement with their faith, but
that's readily understandable in the context of state-supported churches (that
is, churches that people subsidize with their taxes) that often have huge
nominal market share in each country. American churches have to work harder to
keep support, and they do more to appeal to and motivate their members.

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Chocobean
interesting comparison between church and corporation. Some difference,
though:

1) church leaders, the CEOs, are often poorly paid+.

2) The church's revenue source is the members, but its staffing source is also
often the members: you can't just serve and profit, you actually have to train
your next generation of staff from the members/customers.

3) A customer can receive the same level of service without paying, for as
many years as they want.

4) A customer doesn't actually get more or better services by paying more --
they get more by showing up more, for free.

5) Most churches advertise to the poorest rather than the richest portion of
our population. If you are thinking that taking money from the poor is easier
than the rich, you are kidding yourself.

You may be thinking "Yeah but, some churches are the exact opposite of what
you described up there". Yes, I agree with you. Try to remember that just cuz
some A's are B's, not A's are B's.

+I'm talking about the average church: you don't take up preaching for big
bucks(work for a large corp), you start your own following or religion
(startup) for that.

