Thanks Alex. To be clear, though, I’m not advocating these things. I just think that they might be worth thinking about (as I say in the blog, they haven’t even been shown to work yet). People would be acceding to their own will, rather than the “economists” will (whoever they are), because participation in these things is entirely voluntary. Of course, if a poor person (although I don’t mention poor people at all in the blog) was to commit a significant part of his or her income, then checks would probably be put in place to prevent this, because that person may, as you say, suffer as a consequence.

 

Maybe, Alex, just from time to time, you might fight against being guided by your own prejudice? There could be a behavioural economic lesson in that for you.

 

 

On 22/07/2011 16:30, Adam Oliver wrote:

Please have a quick look at the latest blog, which is my take on the idea of paying people to stop smoking

it's encouraging to discover that bribing the poor to accede to the economists' will is being questioned; discouraging though to discover that the answer is apparently that the poor should instead be further impoverished if they fail to accede. Perhaps 'behavioural economics' requires a new sister discipline of 'experiential economics', where economists seek to enhance our well-being by empathising with real people, rather than just manipulating them?

Alex