This paper advocates a variation on James Griffin’s prudential value theory of well-being. Prudential value theory is consistent with various forms of pluralism. It also helps us understand how we do intra- and interpersonal comparisons of well-being. If we start from this view of well-being, I suggest we do not have a problem analogous to Arrow’s impossibility result for a social welfare function: the analogous conditions are not appropriate constraints on a well-being function. The account of well-being is brought to bear on attempts made by some, particularly Dasgupta and Weale, to make international comparisons of well-being. It is argued that difficulties with such attempts occur chiefly because of disanalogies between interpersonal and international comparisons of well-being.
