ABSTRACT
Economists have long struggled with the issue of human values and economic behavior. The debate has ranged from those who deny that economics has anything to say about human values to those who argue that human values are the basic source from which an economic system derives its legitimacy. However, most economists tend to operate in the nebulous area that lies between these two extreme positions, clinging to the view that economics as a "science" is value-free, but not at all comfortable with this position for it denies a certain commonsense reality: economics deals with choices involving the production, distribution, and consumption of scarce resources and in that process it greatly impacts human life.
