scholarly journals Toward Choice-Theoretic Foundations for Behavioral Welfare Economics

2007 ◽  
Vol 97 (2) ◽  
pp. 464-470 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Douglas Bernheim ◽  
Antonio Rangel
Keyword(s):  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Theoretic Foundations

Beyond GDP: The Quest for a Measure of Social Welfare. Part II

2012 ◽  
pp. 32-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Fleurbaey
Keyword(s):  
Social Welfare ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Subjective Well Being ◽  
Alternative Approaches ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Beyond Gdp

The second part of the paper is devoted to the non-monetary indicators of social welfare. Various approaches to the study of subjective well-being and happiness are described. The author shows what problems a researcher would encounter trying to analyze welfare on the micro-level and to take account of the cognitive and affective aspects of the individuals assessment of their well-being, as well as the relevance of social relations. The author also shows to what extent the alternative approaches, particularly the analysis of functionings and capabilities advanced by A. Sen are compatible to the modern welfare economics and what prospects the latter has.

Welfare Economics

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antoinette Baujard
Keyword(s):  
Welfare Economics

The Inner Rational Agent

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Sugden
Keyword(s):  
Human Agency ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Rational Agent ◽  
Empirical Content ◽  
Normative Economics ◽  
Normative Analysis ◽  
True Preference ◽  
Implicit Model ◽  
The World ◽  
Psychological Foundation

Chapter 4 reviews ‘behavioural welfare economics’—the approach to normative analysis that is favoured by most behavioural economists. This approach assumes that people have context-independent ‘true’ or ‘latent’ preferences which, because of psychologically-induced errors, are not always revealed in actual choices. Behavioural welfare economics aims to reconstruct latent preferences by identifying and removing the effects of error on decisions, and to design policies to satisfy those preferences. Its implicit model of human agency is of an ‘inner rational agent’ that interacts with the world through an imperfect psychological ‘shell’. I argue that there is no satisfactory evidence to support this model, and no credible psychological foundation for it. Since the concept of true preference has no empirical content, the idea that such preferences can be reconstructed is a mirage. Normative economics needs to be more radical in giving up rationality assumptions.

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