PH435      Half Unit
Philosophy of Economics: Ethics and Economics

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

Availability

Requisites

Additional requisites:

Students must have completed a university-level introductory course in economics, such as EC1A3 and EC1B3.

This course will investigate various normative issues lying in the intersection of philosophy and economics. It will critically examine methods used by economists for policy evaluation, such as social welfare functions and cost-benefit analysis. And it will consider ethical questions related to economic institutions, such as taxation, property, and use of markets. Questions to be addressed may include the following. What is "well-being" and to what extent can it be measured and compared between individuals? Are inequalities in the distribution of well-being necessarily undesirable or unjust? Can it ever be preferable to prevent a very large number of headaches rather than saving a single life? Should the interests of future generations be given equal weight with those of the current generation? What sorts of goods and services are appropriately exchanged in markets?

15 hours of seminars and 15 hours of lectures in the Winter Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.

This course is delivered through a combination of seminars and lectures totalling a minimum of 30 hours across Winter Term.

Students will be expected to produce a formative essay of 1500 words, which is due in the Winter term.

• Dan Hausman, Michael MacPherson, and Debra Satz (2016), Economic Analysis, Moral Philosophy, Public Policy, 3rd edition.
• Matthew Adler (2019), Measuring Social Welfare: An Introduction.
• John Broome (2009), Ethics out of Economics.
• Amartya Sen (1999), Development as Freedom.
• Elizabeth Anderson (1995), Value in Ethics and Economics.

Essay (70%, 2000 words)

Multiple choice quiz (30%)

Weekly multiple-choice quizzes testing reading comprehension count for 30% of the course grade.