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Zusammenfassung Die Pandemie hat Knappheit sichtbar gemacht und einige Länder zur Rationierung des Zugangs zu Intensivbehandlungen gezwungen. Die Vorhaltung von Betten und Personal auf Intensivstationen müssen vor dem Ausbruch einer Pandemie geplant werden. Die Allokationsregeln für den Aufbau und die Nutzung der Intensivmedizin sollten utilitaristischen Normen folgen. Wir illustrieren dies für die Planung und Nutzung von stationären Vorhalteleistungen. Zudem beschäftigen wir uns mit den Gründen, welche die regulierenden Eingriffe eines Staates rechtfertigen und kritisieren dessen inkonsistentes Handeln bei den massiven Einschränkungen während der Lockdowns im Vergleich zum zögerlichen Vorgehen beim Impfen. Abstract: Utilitarianism Before and During the Pandemic The pandemic reveals shortages and forces some countries to ration access to intensive care. The supply of ICU beds and personal needs to be determined before the pandemic hits. The rules for planning and use of capacities can be the same and follow utilitarian norms. We illustrate this for the hold-back capacities in acute hospital care. In addition, we deal with the reasons that justify the regulatory measures and criticize the inconsistent attitude of governments with regard to the massive containment measures in the lockdowns as compared to the absence of any compulsion within vaccination programs.

Chapter 1. Introduction -- Chapter 2. Basic Tools in Medical Decision Making -- Chapter 3. Basic Tools in Economics: Preferences, Expected Utility, Risk Aversion and Prudence -- Chapter 4. Treatment Decisions -- Chapter 5. Test and Treatment Decisions -- Chapter 6. Prudence and Medical Decision Making -- Chapter 7. Optimal Strategy for Multiple Diagnostic Tests -- Chapter 8. The Optimal Cut-off of a Diagnostic Test -- Chapter 9. The Total Value of Information of a Test -- Chapter 10. The Economics of Medical Decision Making -- Chapter 11. Valuing Health and Life -- Chapter 12. Revealed Preference in Medical Decisions -- Chapter 13. Imperfect Agency and Non-Expected Utility Models.

Although market-based environmental measures like uniform CO2 taxes reach a given standard at minimal cost, they do not prevail in real world policies. An efficiency oriented environmental policy fails, as it involves a redistribution of pollution rights, resulting in a strong and generally effective opposition of the groups that forego economic rents. The present paper analyzes the trade-off between efficiency and political feasibility of several CO2 tax and reimbursement schemes, using a computable general equilibrium model of Switzerland. The simulation results indicate that a policy combining a uniform CO2 tax with differentiated labor subsidies preventing intersectoral redistribution is a better solution for the tradeoff than the presently existing tax schemes in various countries.

Switzerland, following the Kyoto agreement, plans to reduce CO2 emissions by 10% over the next decade with a tax on the use of fossil fuels. This policy, while having a marginal effect on global CO2 emission levels, will have a positive effect on local environmental quality. However, since different sources of energy produce different local external effects, a uniform CO2 tax is ill targeted. This paper shows that a policy setting tax rates equal to the lower bounds of the estimated local marginal external effects would reduce the national CO2 level by 30%. Using a computable general equilibrium model of the Swiss economy, it also finds substantial efficiency gains of Pigovian taxes as compared to a uniform CO2 tax.