What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets

Description

Should we pay children to read books? Is it ethical to pay people to test new drugs or to donate their organs? Sandel examines one of the biggest ethical questions of our time: what is the proper role of markets in a democratic society and how can we protect the moral and civic goods that markets do not honour and money cannot buy?;Introduction : Markets and morals : Market triumphalism ; Everything for sale ; The role of markets ; Our rancorous politics -- 1. Jumping the queue : Airports, amusement parks, car pool lanes ; Hired line standers ; Ticket scalpers ; Concierge doctors ; Markets versus queues ; Yosemite campsites ; Papal masses ; Springsteen concerts -- 2. Incentives : Cash for sterilization ; The economic approach to life ; Paying kids for good grades ; Bribes to lose weight ; Selling the right to immigrate ; A market in refugees ; Speeding tickets and subway cheats ; Tradable procreation permits ; Tradable pollution permits ; Carbon offsets ; Paying to kill an endangered rhino ; Ethics and economics -- 3. How markets crowd out morals : Hired friends ; Bought apologies and wedding toasts ; The case against gifts ; Auctioning college admission ; Coercion and corruption ; Nuclear waste sites ; Donation days and day-care pickups ; Blood for sale ; Economizing love -- 4. Markets in life and death : Janitors insurance ; Betting on death ; Internet death pools ; Insurance versus gambling ; The terrorism futures market ; The lives of strangers ; Death bonds -- 5. Naming rights : Autographs for sale ; Corporate-sponsored home runs ; Luxury skyboxes ; Moneyball ; Bathroom advertising ; Ads in books ; Body billboards ; Branding the public square ; Branded lifguards and nature trails ; Police cars and fire hydrants ; Commercials in the classroom ; Ads in jails ; The skyboxification of everyday life.