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Do people really want to be nudged towards healthy lifestyles?

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  • Robert Sugden

    (University of East Anglia)

Abstract

This paper assesses Thaler and Sunstein’s claim that policies that nudge individuals towards healthy lifestyles promote the welfare of those individuals, as judged by themselves. I argue that Thaler and Sunstein switch between two different interpretations of that clause. One interpretation gives the clause a wide range of applicability, but drains it of its content as a repudiation of paternalism. The other interpretation makes it more meaningful to say that people want to make the choices they are being nudged towards, but applies to a much narrower range of cases than Thaler and Sunstein have in mind.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert Sugden, 2017. "Do people really want to be nudged towards healthy lifestyles?," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 64(2), pages 113-123, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:inrvec:v:64:y:2017:i:2:d:10.1007_s12232-016-0264-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s12232-016-0264-1
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    8. Robert Sugden, 2008. "Why incoherent preferences do not justify paternalism," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 19(3), pages 226-248, September.
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    11. Robert Sugden, 2009. "On Nudging: A Review of Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(3), pages 365-373.
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    Cited by:

    1. Luca Crivelli & Mario Lucchini, 2017. "Health and happiness: an introduction," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 64(2), pages 105-111, June.
    2. Guilhem Lecouteux & Ivan Mitrouchev, 2021. "The "View from Manywhere": Normative Economics with Context-Dependent Preferences," GREDEG Working Papers 2021-19, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    3. Guilhem Lecouteux, 2021. "Reconciling Normative and Behavioural Economics: The Problem that Cannot be Solved," GREDEG Working Papers 2021-27, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    4. Nathan Berg & Yuki Watanabe, 2020. "Conservation of behavioral diversity: on nudging, paternalism-induced monoculture, and the social value of heterogeneous beliefs and behavior," Mind & Society: Cognitive Studies in Economics and Social Sciences, Springer;Fondazione Rosselli, vol. 19(1), pages 103-120, June.
    5. Guilhem Lecouteux, 2018. "What does “we” want? Team Reasoning, Game Theory, and Unselfish Behaviours," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 128(3), pages 311-332.
    6. Gigi Foster, 2018. "Towards a living theoretical spine for (behavioural) economics," Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, Society for the Advancement of Behavioral Economics (SABE), vol. 2(1), pages 75-81, March.
    7. D. Wade Hands, 2020. "Libertarian paternalism: taking Econs seriously," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 67(4), pages 419-441, December.
    8. Braganza, Oliver, 2022. "Market paternalism: Do people really want to be nudged towards consumption?," ifso working paper series 23, University of Duisburg-Essen, Institute for Socioeconomics (ifso).
    9. Fabrice Etilé, 2019. "The Economics of Diet and Obesity: Public Policy," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) hal-02154445, HAL.
    10. Leonhard K. Lades & Wilhelm Hofmann, 2019. "Temptation, self-control, and inter-temporal choice," Journal of Bioeconomics, Springer, vol. 21(1), pages 47-70, April.
    11. Guilhem Lecouteux, 2020. "Welfare Economics in Large Worlds: Welfare and Public Policies in an Uncertain Environment," GREDEG Working Papers 2020-08, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    12. Benno Torgler, 2022. "The power of public choice in law and economics," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(5), pages 1410-1453, December.
    13. Guilhem Lecouteux & Ivan Mitrouchev, 2022. "Preference Purification in Behavioural Welfare Economics: an Impossibility Result," GREDEG Working Papers 2022-31, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    14. Christopher Snowdon, 2018. "Paternalism, Nudging and Liberty," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(1), pages 88-95, February.
    15. Leonhard Lades & Federica Nova, 2022. "Ethical Considerations when using Behavioural Insights to Reduce Peoples Meat Consumption," Working Papers 202209, Geary Institute, University College Dublin.
    16. Becchetti, Leonardo & Salustri, Francesco & Scaramozzino, Pasquale, 2020. "Nudging and corporate environmental responsibility: A natural field experiment," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    17. Osterloh, Margit & Frey, Bruno S., 2019. "Dealing With Randomness," management revue - Socio-Economic Studies, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, vol. 30(4), pages 331-345.
    18. Banerjee, Sanchayan & Galizzi, Matteo M. & John, Peter & Mourato, Susana, 2022. "What works best in promoting climate citizenship? A randomised, systematic evaluation of nudge, think, boost and nudge+," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 115032, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    19. Mozaffar Qizilbash, 2021. "Informed preference consequentialism, contractarianism and libertarian paternalism: on Harsanyi, Rawls and Robert Sugden’s The Community of Advantage," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 68(1), pages 67-88, March.
    20. Cynthia Weiyi Cai, 2020. "Nudging the financial market? A review of the nudge theory," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 60(4), pages 3341-3365, December.
    21. Tobias Schütze & Carsten Spitzer & Philipp C. Wichardt & Philipp Christoph Wichardt, 2023. "Nudging: An Experiment on Transparency, Controlling for Reactance and Decision Time," CESifo Working Paper Series 10599, CESifo.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Nudges; Health; Paternalism; Self-control;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D6 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics
    • I1 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health

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