Overview of Behavioral Economics and Policy

Mark D. White
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Mark D. White: College of Staten Island/CUNY

A chapter in Nudge Theory in Action, 2016, pp 15-36 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract This chapter introduces some of the ethical and practical aspects of behavioral interventions on the part of the government as well as private parties such as individuals and firms. While the subversion of rational processes of deliberation is an important issue to consider with respect to all behavioral interventions, it is the government’s use of these measures to steer people’s choices in their own interests that uniquely invokes the dangers of paternalism and the denial of personal autonomy to pursue one’s idea of the good life. Behavioral interactions that are initiated and directed by decision-makers themselves, however, allow people to make better choices, either by overcoming or by leveraging their cognitive biases and dysfunctions, and more important, to do so in their own true interests.

Keywords: Behavioral Intervention; Cognitive Bias; Behavioral Economic; Legal Scholar; Russell Sage Foundation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:paichp:978-3-319-31319-1_2

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-31319-1_2

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