I'd be about equally happy if offered a solution in terms of GDP or some more abstract metric like "sum of happiness".
Trouble is, all these macroeconomic metrics that can be precisely defined have only a vague and tenuous link to the actual level of prosperity and quality of life, which is impossible to quantify precisely in a satisfactory manner. Moreover, predicting the future consequences of economic events reliably is impossible, despite all the endless reams of macroeconomic literature presenting various models that attempt to do so.
Thus, if you want to ask how your choice will affect the nominal GDP for the current year or some such measure, that's a well-defined q...
This thread is for the discussion of Less Wrong topics that have not appeared in recent posts. If a discussion gets unwieldy, celebrate by turning it into a top-level post.