H. P. Grice and his principle of conversational cost-benefit

cost–benefit analysis: A type of practical reasoning that analyzes or evaluates an issue by calculating how much cost we need to put in and how much interest or benefit the outcome is going to produce. We then choose the alternative that, measured by some common scale, costs least but gains most. It is a standard utility calculus and is widely employed in economic affairs and social policy. In order to apply this sort of reasoning, the goals of an action must be well defined. Furthermore, it must be possible to compare costs of alternative policies in terms of some definite unit and to quantify benefits in a way that renders them commensurable with one another. This approach is therefore limited regarding those moral and social issues that resist quantitative analysis. Not all significant costs and benefits can be measured or can be brought into a system of commensurability. “Cost-benefit analyses are not popular now in some quarters; and they have indeed been misused, by failing to include very important costs and benefits (often because they are not measurable in terms of money).” Hare, Essays on Political Morality