Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7479d7b7d-qs9v7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-12T14:41:56.012Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - Preferences and the Idea of Utility

from Part I - Making Decisions that Maximize Utility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2017

M. Granger Morgan
Affiliation:
Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania
Get access

Summary

Image of the first page of this content. For PDF version, please use the ‘Save PDF’ preceeding this image.'
Type
Chapter
Information
Theory and Practice in Policy Analysis
Including Applications in Science and Technology
, pp. 17 - 50
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2017

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ackerman, F. (1997a). “Utility and Welfare I: The History of Economic Thought,” in Ackerman, F., Kiron, D., Goodwin, N.R., Harris, J.M., and Gallagher, K. (eds.), Human Well-Being and Economic Goals, Island Press, pp. 4957.Google Scholar
Ackerman, F. (1997b). “Utility and Welfare II: Modern Economic Alternatives,” in Ackerman, F., Kiron, D., Goodwin, N.R., Harris, J.M., and Gallagher, K. (eds.), Human Well-Being and Economic Goals, Island Press, pp. 8192.Google Scholar
Adler, D.A. and Posner, E.A. (2006). New Foundations of Cost-Benefit Analysis, Harvard University Press, 236pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arrow, K.J. (1950). “A Difficulty in the Concept of Social Welfare,” Journal of Political Economy, 58, pp. 328346.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bentham, J. (1780). An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. The first edition of this work was printed in 1780 and first published by Clarendon Press in 1789. Republished by Clarendon Press in 1892, 378pp.Google Scholar
Bergson, A. (1954). “On the Concept of Social Welfare,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 68(2), pp. 233252.Google Scholar
Black, D. (1948). “On the Rationale of Group Decision-Making,” Journal of Political Economy, 56(1), pp. 2334.Google Scholar
Blaug, M. (1985). Economic Theory in Retrospect, Cambridge University Press, 737pp.Google Scholar
Cantril, H. (1965). The Pattern of Human Concerns, Rutgers University Press, 427pp.Google Scholar
Davis, K.D., Taylor, S.J., Crawley, A.P., Wood, M.L., and Mikulis, D.J. (1997). “Functional MRI of Pain- and Attention-Related Activations in the Human Cingulate Cortex,” Journal of Neurophysiology, 77(6), pp. 33703380.Google Scholar
Easterlin, R.A. (1974). “Does Economic Growth Improve the Human Lot?” in David, P.A. and Reder, M.W. (eds.), Nations and Households in Economic Growth: Essays in Honor of Moses Abramovitz, Academic Press, pp. 89125. This chapter was reprinted with some revisions as chapter 1 (pp. 1345) of Easterlin, R.A., Happiness, Growth and the Life Cycle, Oxford University Press, 283pp., 2010.Google Scholar
Easterlin, R.A. (1995). “Will Raising the Incomes of All Increase the Happiness of All?,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 27, pp. 3547. This paper was reprinted with some revisions as chapter 2 (pp. 4655) of Easterlin, R.A., Happiness, Growth and the Life Cycle, Oxford University Press, 283pp., 2010.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Easterlin, R.A. (2009). “Lost in Transition: Life Satisfaction on the Road to Capitalism?,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 71, pp. 130145. This chapter was reprinted with some revisions as chapter 4 (pp. 82110) of Easterlin, R.A., Happiness, Growth and the Life Cycle, Oxford University Press, 283pp., 2010.Google Scholar
Easterlin, R.A. (2010). Happiness, Growth and the Life Cycle, Oxford University Press, 283pp.Google Scholar
Easterlin, R.A., Morgan, R., Switek, M., and Wang, F. (2012). “China’s Life Satisfaction, 1990–2010,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 109, pp. 97759780.Google Scholar
Eid, M. and Larsen, R.J. (eds.) (2008). The Science of Subjective Well-Being, Guilford Press, 546pp.Google Scholar
Frey, B.S. and Stutzer, A. (2002). Happiness and Economics, Princeton University Press, 220pp.Google Scholar
Gelman, A. and Hill, J. (2006). Data Analysis Using Regression and Multilevel/Hierarchical Models, Cambridge University Press, 625pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harsanyi, J.C. (1955). “Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparisons of Utility,” Journal of Political Economy, 63, pp. 309321.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Helliwell, J., Layard, R., and Sachs, J. (2012). The World Happiness Report, The Earth Institute, Columbia University, 167pp. Available at: www.earth.columbia.edu/sitefiles/file/Sachs%20Writing/2012/World%20Happiness%20Report.pdf.Google Scholar
Kahneman, D. (1999). “Objective Happiness,” in Kahneman, D., Diener, E., and Schwarz, N. (eds.), Well-Being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology, The Russell Sage Foundation, 593pp.Google Scholar
Kahneman, D., Wakker, P.W., and Sarin, R. (1997). “Back to Bentham? Exploration of Experienced Utility,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 112(2), pp. 375405.Google Scholar
Keeney, R.L. (1992). Value Focused Thinking: A Path to Creative Decisionmaking, Harvard University Press, 416pp.Google Scholar
Keeney, R.L. and Raiffa, H. (1976). Decisions with Multiple Objectives: Preferences and Value Tradeoffs, Wiley, 569pp.Google Scholar
Knight, J. (2012). “Economic Growth and the Human Lot,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 109, pp. 96709671.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Little, I.M.D. (1952). “Social Choice and Individual Values,” Journal of Political Economy, 60(5), pp. 422432.Google Scholar
March, J.G. (1976). “Chapter 5: The Technology of Foolishness,” in March, J.G. and Olsen, J.P. (eds.), Ambiguity and Choice in Organizations, Universitetsforlaget, pp. 6981.Google Scholar
March, J.G. (1978). “Bounded Rationality, Ambiguity, and the Engineering of Choice,” The Bell Journal of Economics, 9(2), pp. 587608.Google Scholar
Myers, D.G. and Diener, E. (1995). “Who Is Happy?,” Psychological Science, 6(1), pp. 1019.Google Scholar
Myers, D.G. and Diener, E. (1996). “The Pursuit of Happiness,” Scientific American, May, pp. 7072.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nettle, D. (2005). Happiness: The Science behind Your Smile, Oxford University Press, 216pp.Google Scholar
NRC (2013). Subjective Well-Being: Measuring Happiness, Suffering, and Other Dimensions of Experience, National Academy Press, 204pp.Google Scholar
Rawles, J. (1972). A Theory of Justice, Clarendon Press, 607pp.Google Scholar
Sagoff, M. (2004). Price, Principle, and the Environment, Cambridge University Press, 284pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savage, L.J. (1954). The Foundations of Statistics, Wiley, 294pp.Google Scholar
Smith, A. (1776). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, republished in 1937 by The Modern Library Random House, 976pp.Google Scholar
Stevens, S.S. (1946). “On the Theory of Scales of Measurement,” Science, 103, pp. 677680.Google Scholar
Stigler, G.J. (1950a). “The Development of Utility Theory I,” Journal of Political Economy, 58(4), pp. 307327.Google Scholar
Stigler, G.J. (1950b). “The Development of Utility Theory II,” Journal of Political Economy, 58(5), pp. 373396.Google Scholar
Strack, F., Argyle, M., and Schwarz, N. (eds.) (1991). Subjective Well-Being: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, Pergamon, 291pp.Google Scholar
Szpiro, G. (2013). “Value Judgments,” Nature, 500, pp. 521523.Google Scholar
Tukey, J.W. (1977). Exploratory Data Analysis, Addison-Wesley, 688pp.Google Scholar
Velleman, P.F. and Wilkinson, L. (1993). “Nominal, Ordinal, Interval, and Ratio Typologies Are Misleading,” The American Statistician, 47, pp. 6572.Google Scholar
von Neumann, J. and Morgenstern, O. (1944). Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, Princeton University Press, 625pp. (3rd ed., 1953, 641pp.).Google Scholar
von Winterfeldt, D. and Edwards, W. (1986). Decision Analysis and Behavioral Research, Cambridge University Press, 604pp.Google Scholar
White, A.G. (2007). “A Global Projection of Subjective Well-being: A Challenge to Positive Psychology,” Psychtalk, 56, pp. 1720.Google Scholar
Zeckhauser, R. and Schaefer, E. (1968). “Public Policy and Normative Economic Theory,” in Bauer, R. and Gergen, K. (eds.), The Study of Policy Formation, The Free Press.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×