Compensating the dead

Fleurbaey, Marc;Leroux, Marie-Louise;Ponthiere, Gregory
(2014) Journal of Mathematical Economics — Vol. 51, p. 28-41 (2014)

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  • Fleurbaey, MarcPrinceton University
    Author
  • Leroux, Marie-LouiseUniversité du Québec à Montréal
    Author
  • Ponthiere, GregoryParis School of Economics
    Author
Abstract
An early death is, undoubtedly, a serious disadvantage. However, the compensation of short-lived individuals has remained so far largely unexplored, probably because it appears infeasible. Indeed, short-lived agents can hardly be identified ex ante, and cannot be compensated ex post. We argue that, despite those difficulties, a compensation can be carried out by encouraging early consumption in the life cycle. In a model with heterogeneous preferences and longevities, we show how a specific social criterion can be derived from intuitive principles, and we study the corresponding optimal policy under various informational assumptions
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Fleurbaey, M., Leroux, M.-L., & Ponthiere, G. (2014). Compensating the dead. Journal of Mathematical Economics, 51, 28-41. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmateco.2014.02.003 (Original work published 2014)