Abstract

Inaugural Cambridge Behavioural Policy Lecture with Prof Cass R Sunstein, Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard.

Abstract

Behaviorally informed interventions include nudges, taxes, subsidies, bans, and mandates. In evaluating such interventions, policymakers should consider both their welfare effects (including, for example, their potentially negative effects on subjective well-being) and their effects on distributive justice (including, for example, their potentially negative effects on those at the bottom of the economic ladder).

The talk will address several specific questions :

- What are the aggregate effects on social welfare? - Who is likely to be helped and who is likely to be hurt? - What are the expected effects on the least well-off? -Do the welfare benefits to those helped exceed the welfare costs to those hurt?

About the speaker

We are delighted to welcome Prof Cass R Sunstein to Cambridge for the launch event of the El-Erian Institute of Behavioural Economics and Policy.

Prof Sunstein is among the most cited and most-read legal scholars worldwide; his impact has been equally strong on research and policy in the fields of environmental issues, climate change, and public health.

In addition to a distinguished academic career he advises governments and corporations worldwide on behaviourally informed regulation to promote sustainability, safety, and social issues.

Prof Sunstein has served in senior advisory positions under Presidents Obama and Biden, in roles spanning the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, the Department of Defense and recently the Department of Homeland Security.

We will facilitate social distancing in the lecture hall as far as possible. However, please think about your own comfort and safety and that of other delegates ahead of the event. We invite all delegates to wear paper masks if they wish to do so.