Kidney markets are prohibited in principle because they are assumed to undermine the seller’s dignity. Considering the trade-off between saving more lives by introducing regulated kidney markets and preserving the seller’s dignity, we argue that it is advisable to demand that citizens restrain their own moral judgements and not interfere with the judgements of those who are willing to sell a kidney. We also argue that it is advisable not only to limit the political implications of the moral argument of dignity concerns toward a market-based solution but also to re-evaluate the dignity argument itself. First, if the dignity argument is to be given normative force, it must also consider the dignity violation of the potential transplant recipient. Second, there seems to be no compelling notion of dignity that demonstrates why it is morally permissible to donate but not to sell a kidney.

Assume a pandemic in which, despite all efforts of vaccine persuasion, too many people are hesitant toward vaccination for a laissez-faire regime to reach herd immunity on a strictly voluntary basis. Then, basically four policy options are available-(a) moral appeals, (b) legal obligation, (c) monetary fines, and (d) monetary rewards. In this article, we demonstrate that the prevalent vaccination debate chooses the wrong starting point in discussing these options. Rather than asking how vaccine hesitancy can be overcome as a (bothersome) hindrance toward reaching herd immunity, we ask how one can reach herd immunity in due time while minimizing the (subjectively perceived) offense to the dignity of vaccine-hesitant citizens. This change in perspective favors paying people for getting vaccinated instead of sanctioning them for not doing so. With respect to the COVID-19 crisis, we show that a payment strategy is both feasible and advisable. This may be an important insight not only in the short term, but also with respect to future pandemics that are likely to come.