The misery equation

Reducing suffering should be the main goal of policy

In a world of limited resources, one of the main aims of government is to reduce misery and suffering by as much as possible, especially for the worst-off members of society. This requires that we can identify: (1) who are the worst-off groups; and (2) interventions that reduce misery in cost-effective ways (which will include the benefits that come from less reliance on public services when misery is reduced). Both considerations require that we have a robust measure of misery, and welfare more generally, that is also acceptable to policymakers and to the public. Increasingly, a consensus is emerging that our understanding of welfare should, to some considerable extent, rely on reports of subjective wellbeing (SWB) i.e., on how satisfied people are with their lives and how feel as they go about them.

SWB is now one of the recommended measures of benefit in the UK Treasury Green Book guidance on economic appraisal, thus providing a common yardstick by which to assess policies and programmes. When reports of life experiences are combined with data on life expectancies, it is possible to calculate the number of wellbeing-adjusted life years (WELLBYs) that different individuals and groups will experience with and without government intervention. Governments should seek to allocate resources to maximise equity weighted WELLBYs, where the equity weights are determined by how much additional weight society wishes to give to those with the worst life experiences and/or the lowest life expectancies.