School of Business Administration

Andrew brings 15 years of valuable research and teaching experience in the economics discipline,” said School of Business Administration Dean Trevor Collier. “His enthusiasm for considering the role of Catholic social teaching in evaluating capitalism’s relationship to the common good will be an incredible asset to our entire campus community.” 

The Albrecht Chair in the economics and finance department was established with a gift from alumnus Thomas W. Albrecht '76 and his wife, Ellen. Read more about their gift here.

Beauchamp holds a doctorate in economics from Duke University and previously taught at Boston College. Trained as a structural applied microeconomist, he has studied a broad array of topics, including family and demographic economics; the economics of education; crime; and retirement. More recently he has broadened his research agenda to include questions related to how social virtues affect economic life and the common good. He brings with him a history of publishing interdisciplinary work in economics and theology journals. At UD, he will develop a new course on integrating Catholic social teaching with the economic analysis of contentious issues, as well as a course examining the moral foundations of free market capitalism and how the two influence the common good. Additionally, he will collaborate with community and religious leaders, industry experts, policymakers, and campus and community partners; and deepen his research agenda through engagement with Catholic theological expertise on campus. He begins at UD on July 1.

“The growth in market access across the globe has been an incredibly powerful force for good, lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty,” Beauchamp said. However, he cautioned, “this new power, as Pope Francis highlighted for us, ‘has not been accompanied by a development in human responsibility.’” 

In describing his interest in coming to UD, Beauchamp said he believed the timing could not have been better. 

“At this moment, we urgently need to access the moral wisdom of the Catholic intellectual tradition to help steer our economy toward the common good,” he said. “I could not be more excited to help our students, business and ecclesial stakeholders, along with the larger UD community, access this wisdom. Together we must navigate this time by better understanding and engaging with the insights of Catholic social teaching on the economy.”