Summary UEC – Lecture Notes
LECTURE 1
A nudge is any aspect of the choice argitecture that alters people’s behavior in a predictable
way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives.
Bounded rationality: people are not fully rational; they do not take all the information into
account.
Bounded willpower: people are not fully able to control themselves
Bounded selfishness: people are not only concerned about their own outcome.
LECTURE 2
Degrowth: a declining state is unavoidably coming upon us: ensuring that his process will
lead to a more just society with a different image of a ‘good life’ and not a catastrophic
economic recession is the challenging task we are faced with now.
- Challenges hegemony of economic growth
- Calls for downscaling of production and consumption
- Aims to achieve environmental sustainability, social justice, and wellbeing
Moral economy: economic activities that are influenced by moral political norms &
sentiments. A political economy which promotes & prioritizes wellbeing and flourishing
that’s underpinned by the right decision & good behavior.
Descriptive morality: condes of conduct put forward by society or accepted by an individual
for her own behavior
Normative morality: codes of conduct that would be put forward by all rational people.
State regulation = macro level
Collective custom = meso level
Lay normative = micro level
LECTURE 3
Income inequality has a negative impact on health measured by various indicators
Egalitarian view on health care:
- It’s for everyone
- Public financed system
- Distribution according to need
Libertarian view on health care:
- Access is par of society’s reward system
- Privately financed
- Distribution according to willingness to pay/ability to pay
Horizontal equity: the equal treatment of equals; people with similar needs need to have the
same opportunities to access and use care
, Vertical equity: the unequal treatment of unequals; people with specific needs need to be
able to get that care
- Progressive system: income spent on care rises as income rises (K>0)
- Regressive system: income spent on care falls as income rises (K<0)
- Proportional system: income spent on care doesn’t vary as income rises (K=0)
LECTURE 4
Hedonic: pleasure seeking
Eudemonic: flourishing everybody’s skills come out
Behind actions lay unobserved needs and desires that motivate human behavior.
Wellbeing is a multidimensional framework that includes cognitive evaluations of positive &
negative effects.
Subjective reports of happiness:
- In the past are lower than in the present
- In the future are higher than in the present
Decision utility = perceived satisfaction associated with choice among several alternatives.
Experienced utility = satisfaction realized from the outcome chosen
Happiness = momentary feeling of joy & pleasure
Life-satisfaction = overall contentment with life
Wellbeing = more general state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy in society
Welfare = the health, happiness, and financial wealth of a person or a group
Objective measures of wellbeing = based on observations and evaluations by an impartial
outsider
Subjective reports of wellbeing = based on self-appraisals of implicit criteria
Subjective wellbeing of consumers is influenced by:
- Reference effects: relative outcomes can be more important for individuals than
absolute outcomes
- Effort reduction: making life easy, making easy choices
- Values & experiences: at a given point, individuals may derive wellbeing from
experiences rather than from consumption itself
Endowment effect: acquiring material possessions = more happiness
Easterlin paradox: happiness goes together with income, but at a certain point in time,
happiness does not grow when income grows.
LECTURE 1
A nudge is any aspect of the choice argitecture that alters people’s behavior in a predictable
way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives.
Bounded rationality: people are not fully rational; they do not take all the information into
account.
Bounded willpower: people are not fully able to control themselves
Bounded selfishness: people are not only concerned about their own outcome.
LECTURE 2
Degrowth: a declining state is unavoidably coming upon us: ensuring that his process will
lead to a more just society with a different image of a ‘good life’ and not a catastrophic
economic recession is the challenging task we are faced with now.
- Challenges hegemony of economic growth
- Calls for downscaling of production and consumption
- Aims to achieve environmental sustainability, social justice, and wellbeing
Moral economy: economic activities that are influenced by moral political norms &
sentiments. A political economy which promotes & prioritizes wellbeing and flourishing
that’s underpinned by the right decision & good behavior.
Descriptive morality: condes of conduct put forward by society or accepted by an individual
for her own behavior
Normative morality: codes of conduct that would be put forward by all rational people.
State regulation = macro level
Collective custom = meso level
Lay normative = micro level
LECTURE 3
Income inequality has a negative impact on health measured by various indicators
Egalitarian view on health care:
- It’s for everyone
- Public financed system
- Distribution according to need
Libertarian view on health care:
- Access is par of society’s reward system
- Privately financed
- Distribution according to willingness to pay/ability to pay
Horizontal equity: the equal treatment of equals; people with similar needs need to have the
same opportunities to access and use care
, Vertical equity: the unequal treatment of unequals; people with specific needs need to be
able to get that care
- Progressive system: income spent on care rises as income rises (K>0)
- Regressive system: income spent on care falls as income rises (K<0)
- Proportional system: income spent on care doesn’t vary as income rises (K=0)
LECTURE 4
Hedonic: pleasure seeking
Eudemonic: flourishing everybody’s skills come out
Behind actions lay unobserved needs and desires that motivate human behavior.
Wellbeing is a multidimensional framework that includes cognitive evaluations of positive &
negative effects.
Subjective reports of happiness:
- In the past are lower than in the present
- In the future are higher than in the present
Decision utility = perceived satisfaction associated with choice among several alternatives.
Experienced utility = satisfaction realized from the outcome chosen
Happiness = momentary feeling of joy & pleasure
Life-satisfaction = overall contentment with life
Wellbeing = more general state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy in society
Welfare = the health, happiness, and financial wealth of a person or a group
Objective measures of wellbeing = based on observations and evaluations by an impartial
outsider
Subjective reports of wellbeing = based on self-appraisals of implicit criteria
Subjective wellbeing of consumers is influenced by:
- Reference effects: relative outcomes can be more important for individuals than
absolute outcomes
- Effort reduction: making life easy, making easy choices
- Values & experiences: at a given point, individuals may derive wellbeing from
experiences rather than from consumption itself
Endowment effect: acquiring material possessions = more happiness
Easterlin paradox: happiness goes together with income, but at a certain point in time,
happiness does not grow when income grows.
