Confronting the Labor Problem in Catholic Higher Education: Applying Catholic Social Teaching in an Age of Increasing Inequality

Abstract

Over the past four decades, the United States has witnessed the rise of an economy of growing inequality and exploitation, and this economic transformation has entangled Catholic institutions of higher education in what Pope Francis has called “an economy of exclusion and inequality.” In recent years, some institutions have taken steps to resolve this contradiction; Georgetown University makes for a noteworthy example. Yet Catholic colleges and universities still have work to do to address the labor problems of the 21st century. If they commit themselves to that project, they can provide needed leadership in the fight for a more just social order.