Steven A. Ramirez

Social Justice and Capitalism: An Assessment of the Teachings of Pope Francis from a Law and Macroeconomics Perspective

Pope Francis’s application and extension of longstanding Catholic social teachings to compelling contemporary problems helps to focus attention on such problems. Global economic inequality and growing economic inequality in the United States has already imposed trillions in excess costs on the economy for the enhanced wealth of a relative handful of global elites. Now global warming promises another massive wealth transfer of trillions of dollars from the global economy and the poorest among us for the benefit of a small number of energy industry elites. This article puts the teachings of Pope Francis on inequality and the environment in macroeconomic perspective.

Taking Economic Human Rights Seriously

The current construction of globalization allows capital to move freely but not labor. This builds in a bias toward lower wages. This cheap labor model threatens a crisis in buying power. Globalization needs to be reconfigured to build durable buying power as well as more widely distributed development. Human capital development is key to these goals. One means of spurring broader development and durable buying power would be for the international financial institutions to enhance their efforts to enforce economic human rights.