Would you trade the ability to climb a flight of stairs for the assurance that your country is protecting democratic freedoms? A new study asked Americans to weigh surprising tradeoffs—health versus dignity, income versus rights, convenience versus environmental quality. The answers revealed consistent patterns in how people value very different aspects of life, offering a practical way to compare “apples and oranges” in policy decisions. The approach could help governments, hospitals, and other institutions design choices that reflect real human priorities.

[Hebrew University] — What’s more valuable: the physical ability to walk up a flight of stairs, or the knowledge that your country is upholding democratic norms? A new study led by Prof. Ori Heffetz of Hebrew University and Cornell University and his colleagues, Prof. Daniel J. Benjamin (UCLA), Prof. Kristen B. Cooper (Gordon College), Prof. Miles S. Kimball (University of Colorado), and Ph.D. student Tushar Kundu (Columbia University), dives deep into how ordinary people assign value to very different aspects of life—and how their answers can inform smarter public policy.

Turning Intuition into Data

Using a large-scale survey (896 respondents) across the U.S., the research team asked people to make a series of tradeoffs between things that usually don’t get compared: health versus family, income versus dignity, convenience versus rights. How much happiness would you give up if your local air quality worsened? What is it worth to feel respected in your community? The responses revealed not just priorities—but a new, practical way to measure them.

“We often talk about values as if they’re impossible to compare,” researchers said. “But when you give people a clear choice, they reveal a lot about what really matters to them.”

The Problem with Apples and Oranges

Economists and policymakers have long struggled with comparing so-called “apples and oranges” when designing policies. How do you weigh public health against freedom of speech? Jobs versus environmental protection? This study shows that the public is not only capable of answering such questions, but that their collective responses form consistent patterns that can guide tough policy decisions.

In one striking result, the authors found that individuals are surprisingly coherent in how they assign value across domains—even if they start from different personal experiences. This suggests that well-constructed surveys can meaningfully capture what people consider a “better” life.

A Tool for Policy, Grounded in Humanity

The study goes beyond academic theory. It offers a practical framework for institutions like governments, hospitals, or international agencies to evaluate policy tradeoffs using real human judgments—rather than arbitrary dollar values or political ideology.

“We’re offering a scientifically grounded, yet deeply human, approach to measuring wellbeing,” say the researchers. “It’s about listening to people when they tell us what matters most to them—and then using that to make better decisions.”

The research paper titled “What do People Want” is now available in National Bureau of Economic Research and can be accessed at https://www.nber.org/papers/w33846

 DOI is 10.3386/w33846

Researchers:

Daniel J. Benjamin¹, Kristen B. Cooper², Ori Heffetz^3,4, Miles S. Kimball⁵, Tushar Kundu⁶

Institutions:

1. University of California (UCLA)
2. Gordon College (Wenham, MA)
3. Department of Economics and Center for Rationality, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
4. Cornell University
5. University of Colorado Boulder
6. Columbia University