Welfare-Optimal Status Planning of Minority Languages: An Economic Approach

18 Pages Posted: 4 May 2011

See all articles by Bengt-Arne Wickström

Bengt-Arne Wickström

Research group "Economics and Language" - REAL; Andrássy-Universität Budapest

Date Written: April 29, 2011

Abstract

We analyze normatively determined distributions of language rights in multilingual settings. It is shown in a welfare-maximizing model where rights today influence the status of a language in the future, that the “naïve” ex ante cost-benefit analysis has to be augmented in various directions. This has its roots in the dynamic aspect of the rights and the resulting endogeneity of preferences as well as in the discrete character of rights. It is shown how efficiency and distribution considerations are affected by these considerations.

Keywords: minority rights, changeable preferences, dynamic preferences, welfare function, second-best analysis, overlapping generations

JEL Classification: D630

Suggested Citation

Wickström, Bengt-Arne, Welfare-Optimal Status Planning of Minority Languages: An Economic Approach (April 29, 2011). CESifo Working Paper Series No. 3427, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1831096 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1831096

Bengt-Arne Wickström (Contact Author)

Research group "Economics and Language" - REAL ( email )

Research Group "Economics and Language"
Unter den Linden 6
Berlin, 10099
Germany

Andrássy-Universität Budapest ( email )

Pollack Mihály tér 3
Budapest, 1088
Hungary

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