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A review of Adler's "Measuring social Welfare"

Author

Listed:
  • Antoinette Baujard

    (Univ Lyon, UJM Saint-Etienne, GATE UMR 5824, 42023 Saint-Etienne, France)

Abstract

This paper is a book review of Matthew Adler's bool "Measuring Social Welfare: An Introduction", published at OUP in 2019. The book is an introduction to the social welfare function approach, meant to assess social welfare and help public decision making, as a comprehensive and welcome alternative to cost-benefit analysis. The review first provides a number of references to situate the contribution of the book in the literature. Secondly, it insists on the fact that the social welfare approach is able to express transparently normative criteria, by contrast with CBA. Thirdly, it highlights that, after the focus on efficiency, the book well illustrates how to incorporate wider distributive criteria; it also enables to encompass different kinds of public policies beyond fiscal redistribution. Fourthly, it regrets that the book does not yet illustrate how to cope with the diversity of values and relevant information beyond utility and income, however introduced as theoretically possible.

Suggested Citation

  • Antoinette Baujard, 2021. "A review of Adler's "Measuring social Welfare"," Working Papers 2113, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    • Handle: RePEc:gat:wpaper:2113
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marc Fleurbaey & Peter Hammond, 2004. "Interpersonally comparable utility," Post-Print hal-00247066, HAL.
    2. Fleurbaey,Marc & Maniquet,François, 2011. "A Theory of Fairness and Social Welfare," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521887427, November.
    3. Antoinette Baujard, 2021. "Values in Welfare economics," Working Papers halshs-03244909, HAL.
    4. Roger Backhouse & Antoinette Baujard & Tamotsu Nishizawa, 2021. "Welfare Theory, Public Action and Ethical Values: Revisiting the history of welfare economics," Post-Print halshs-03024001, HAL.
    5. Backhouse,Roger E. & Baujard,Antoinette & Nishizawa,Tamotsu (ed.), 2021. "Welfare Theory, Public Action, and Ethical Values," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108841450, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Welfare economics; social welfare function; social welfare approach; efficiency; distribution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • I30 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General

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