Economics is to study human activities which are conductive which are conductive to human welfare in its material aspect. Wealth furnishes man with material means of satisfying his wants and of promoting his welfare. Economists, in so far as they study wealth, can be legitimately regarded as studying causes of material welfare. The range of our enquiry becomes restricted to that part of social welfare. Welfare can be divided as ‘Individual Welfare’ and ‘Social Welfare’ and again as ‘General Welfare’ and ‘Economic Welfare’.
Individual welfare and Social welfare:
Individual welfare refers to the sum-total of satisfaction derived by an individual from the consumption of economic goods. Individual satisfaction is linked with individual choice. He chooses the combination which gives him the maximum satisfaction. Social welfare is an aggregate of the utilities or satisfaction of all the individuals in the society. The welfare of all the individuals is synonymous with the welfare of the society. The object of social welfare is to secure for each human being the economic necessities, a decent standard of health and living conditions, equal opportunities with his fellow citizens, and the highest possible degree of self respect and freedom of thought and action without interfering with same rights of others.
General welfare and Economic welfare:
General welfare of an individual refers to the state of mind or happiness which an individual enjoys due to number of factors such as economic and also various other factors such as friendship, health, religious beliefs, philosophical outlook on life and so on. Thus, general welfare refers to the satisfaction derived by an individual from both economic and non-economic factors.
Economic welfare is a function of the satisfaction derived from the use of exchangeable material goods and services almost confine with real national income of the community. Economics confines itself to social welfare of all persons alone. The subject of economics is the well-being of persons as consumers and producers and the possible ways of improving that well-being or welfare.
Welfare Economics:
Economics can be divide as ‘Positive economics’ And ‘Welfare economics ‘. Positive economics may be said refer to the analysis of the theories or principles of economics, while welfare economics may be said to confine itself to an examination of economic policies. Positive economics builds up analytical tools; welfare economics applies such tools to specific economic situations to maximize economic welfare. Positive economics is merely theoretical; welfare economics is prescriptive in nature.
