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The Value of Living

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 August 2016

John Broome
John Broome*
Affiliation:
University of Bristol
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Summary

Many practical decisions, in medicine and elsewhere, alter the lengths of people’s lives; many affect the number of people who are born; and many do both. Decision makers need to attach a value to changes of these sorts. In the past the value of prolonging life and the value of changes in population have generally been treated separately. This paper explains the need for an integrated treatment: a theory of the value of living. In one sense, prolonging a life and bringing into existence an extra person are alternative ways of doing the same thing: both bring it about that a period of life is lived that otherwise would not have been lived. But there is also a vital difference: in one case the extra period of life comes to someone who exists already; in the other it comes to a new person. The paper discusses a number of principles that might be used in developing an integrated theory of the value of living.

Résumé

Résumé

En médecine comme dans d’autres domaines, de nombreuses décisions affectent la durée de vie de certaines personnes ou/et le nombre de naissances. Et les preneurs de décisions doivent évaluer les changements ainsi causés. Jusqu’à présent, la valeur d’un prolongement de vie et celle d’un changement de population étaient en général traitées séparément. Cet article explique la nécessité d’un traitement intégré : une théorie de la valeur de la vie. En un sens, prolonger une vie et donner naissance à une personne supplémentaire correspondent à deux façons de produire un même résultat : elles produisent une période de vie qui autrement n’aurait pas existé. Mais il y a également une différence cruciale : dans un cas la période de vie supplémentaire concerne une personne qui existe déjà, dans l’autre elle correspond à une nouvelle personne. L’article discute plusieurs principes qui pourraient servir à développer une théorie intégrée de la valeur de la vie.

Keywords

024024
Type
Research Article
Information
Recherches Économiques de Louvain/ Louvain Economic Review , Volume 58 , Issue 2 , 1992 , pp. 125 - 142
Copyright
Copyright © Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de recherches économiques et sociales 1992 

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Footnotes

(*)

This paper was written with the support of the Economic and Social Research Council, under grant number R 000 23 3334.

References

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