Alvin Roth: Moral Economics, from Prostitution to Kidney Transplant Markets
From The Origins Podcast with Lawrence Krauss by Lawrence M. Krauss
May 12, 2026 · 1h 42m
About this episode
Alvin Roth discusses his work on market design and its implications for public policy, including controversial topics like prostitution and kidney transplants.
Alvin Roth is a Nobel Prizewinning Economist whose work on designing markets has had real world impacts that may have saved thousands of lives around the world, while arousing strong emotions both for and against the programs he has helped put in place. Clearly not one to shy away from controversy, he represents the best of what The Origins Project is trying to promote: applying science and reason to public policy. In short, connecting science and culture! Roth’s new book, which is fantastic, and comes out the same day this podcast is released deals with issues that often raise the public’s ire, from legalizing prostitution, to assisted suicide, and finally to a rational market for kidney transplants. For example, everywhere there is good date, legalizing prostitution reduces not only incidents of sexually transmitted disease, but also violent sexual assaults. It may also combat illegal human trafficking. As far as kidney transplants are concerned, in the US alone, over 130,000 kidney failures occur each year, and only 20,000-30,000 transplants are performed, because of a lack of suitable kidney donors. Roth has already helped resolve one bottleneck, connecting donors with those…
People in this episode
Host: Lawrence M. Krauss
Guest: Alvin Roth
Topics covered
- moral economics
- market design
- kidney transplant
- prostitution
- public policy
- Nobel Prize
Keywords
- Alvin Roth
- moral economics
- kidney transplant markets
- prostitution
- Nobel Prize
- market design
- public policy
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: The Origins Project
Books & works: Roth’s new book
Places: US
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