The Amish famously refuse anything that smacks of government dependence. They opt out of Social Security, agricultural subsidies, Medicaid, Medicare, and generally any sort of public welfare program. Strangely, this is news for Ohio’s Department of Job and Family Services. Ohio has the largest Amish population in the nation, by far. Yet they recently decided that the Amish needed to step up their Food Stamp…
In the Amish world, when disaster strikes, you help your neighbor. Sometimes that means going two or three states away to clean up. And it’s not just Amish helping Amish–after all, in the grand scheme of things, you, English person, are a neighbor too. Amish often travel to help non-Amish rebuild after hurricanes, such as the Hugo storm in the early 90’s. Amish were active…
‘Amish’ sells. Whether it’s an overpriced bag of trail mix or a six-figure kitchen cabinet installation, people gravitate towards the implicit quality of anything with the Amish label. Exactly what does that label mean anyway? Does tobacco grown in the general vicinity of Amish country count as ‘Amish’? What about an RV produced at a factory with Amish workers? Does an Amish person actually have…
“The only treasure we can take with us to heaven is our children.” This came from a mother of five in Holmes county, Ohio, but it could have been just about any Amish parent. For the Amish, children are a blessing, not a burden.  Large Amish families are common. America has gone from being an agrarian to an industrial and now a post-industrial nation. We…
The Amish, according to Julia Erickson of Temple University, are among the fastest-growing communities in the world. Â Amish average seven children per family. Must be something in the water.
Richard Easterlin, USC economics professor, writes in his “Building a Better Theory of Well-Being”: (deep breath) ‘…adaptation and social comparison affect utility more in pecuniary than nonpecuniary domains. The failure of individuals to anticipate that these influences disproportionately undermine utility in the pecuniary domain leads to an excessive allocation of time to pecuniary goals at the expense of nonpecuniary goals, such as family life and…
Three months on, and the accolades and articles continue to pour out lauding the Nickel Mines Amish. What a powerful example. Powerful because in their forgiveness of the killer, they gave up all claim of moral superiority. The Amish were essentially saying that yes, we hurt, but we will heal. We will forgive–that is always the first step. This was not the first time the…
In the Amish world, ‘P’ comes before ‘C’. Production is the ‘P’ in this instance. Consumption is secondary–even though some Amish have credit cards, they are used much less liberally than those of most modern Americans. No, the Amish are producers first–and what they produce has grown in scope in recent years. Classically linked with farming, the group has lately undergone an entrepreneurial revolution of…
News flash from the Amish of southern Ontario: exercise more, and you’ll be thinner. It turns out that walking and working work wonders for the overweight.  According to an NYT article, researchers found virtually no obesity within a Canadian Amish settlement. Eyewitness reports attest to similarly slim-and-trim Amish in communities all across America. This despite one of the heartiest, fattiest, just-like-grandma-used-to-make type diets you can…
Most Amish look alike to the man on the street. In reality the group is surprisingly diverse. Though tied by a set of core beliefs, the Amish have no national governing body, no pope nor patriarch. The individual congregation, guided by its bishop, decides its own rules and customs. This decentralized approach, along with a widely varying tolerance for progressive ideas, creates many different ‘flavors’…