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- Title
Merely Means Paternalist? Prospect Theory and "Debiased" Welfare Analysis.
- Authors
Thoma, Johanna
- Abstract
Behavioral welfare economics usually aims at mere means paternalism, helping agents better pursue their own goals. This paper discusses one initially promising way to inform policies addressed at agents who violate expected utility theory (EUT), namely what I call "CPT debiasing." I argue that this approach is problematic even if we grant the normative authority of EUT, the descriptive adequacy of CPT (cumulative prospect theory), and the general acceptability of means paternalism. First, it is doubtful whether the CPT utility function measures what its proponents intend. Second, by imposing risk neutrality on agents, the approach involves a more problematic paternalism.
- Subjects
PROSPECT theory; UTILITY theory; WELFARE economics; EXPECTED utility; UTILITY functions
- Publication
Philosophy of Science, 2024, Vol 91, Issue 1, p204
- ISSN
0031-8248
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1017/psa.2023.106