A little bit more about opportunity cost

[philmophlegm]

We've seen how opportunity cost is a concept that measures the cost of something in terms of what you have to give up to get it.

So what?

Comments

[miss_next]

Now you're right into the territory of what my academic colleagues do at work.

[philmophlegm]

Is that health economics or something more general?

[miss_next]

Basically health economics, yes, though we've also got a strong decision modelling element. The full name of the section is "Health Economics and Decision Science". So we have health economists, but also mathematicians specialising in OR, statisticians, systematic reviewers and so on.

[alitalf]

I have long thought that a value for human life is needed, uncomfortable though the subject is. It is more difficult to compare the value of, for example, subsidising cultural or sports events with the spending of that money *in a productive way* on improving the NHS.

Then there is the question of whether it would make sense to borrow, and solve *both* Watford fever and Reading plague this year, but then lack the funds to solve any further diseases that arise for several years.