Sugden v. Sunstein on Nudging, Round 2: Sunstein's Turn

Cass R. Sunstein, “’Better Off, as Judged by Themselves’: A Comment on Evaluating Nudges.” International Review of Economics 65(1): 1-8, March 2018.

[Round 1 here; Round 3 here]

• In trying to improve wellbeing, individuals’ judgments of their own welfare are a central metric. This metric is complicated, however, if people have different judgments before and after a nudge, say. 

• Sugden argues that two potential interpretations of “as judged by themselves” (AJBT) are flawed, one by applying only to relatively rare self-control issues, and the second by allowing individual preferences to be sacrificed to the whims of nudgers. 

• Sugden's title asks if people really want to be nudged towards healthier living. The empirical answer is “yes.” 

• AJBT is not our method to rule out charges of paternalism, but rather, to limit the coercive element of paternalistic acts – like a GPS, we want to improve “navigability,” so people can better serve their own interests. Nudges are about means, not ends. 

• Reminders (such as text messages) serve people’s pre-nudge preferences -- likewise with information provision, as with calorie counts. Other nudges can change behaviors in a manner that the nudged individual endorses after-the-fact, but not before, such as a mechanism to dissuade texting while driving. 

• With self-control problems (akrasia), nudges might help to bolster Dr. Jekyll (planner) at Mr. Hyde’s (doer) expense. Sunstein asked folks online if they had a self-control problem: the majority said yes. And programs to ends addictions are quite popular. 

• Yes, preferences can be formed in the process of elicitation; for instance, people might stick with, and endorse, any of various default settings. Then nudgers are forming preferences, but AJBT limits what nudgers can do. 

• To summarize, some nudges serve ex ante preferences when they increase navigability; some help with (widespread!) self-control shortcomings; and some contribute to preference formation, but in a manner that still respects after-the-fact preferences.