Facebook Inc. took a momentous action last week. And I don’t mean its announced intention to sell shares for $28 to $35 in an initial public offering later this month.

Informed, willing and healthy prisoners should not be deprived of the opportunity to help the sick while improving their own prospects once they are free.

Meaningful rewards for living donations could provide the answer to the kidney shortage.

Sally Satel assembles medical practitioners, legal scholars, economists, and ethicists to evaluate the merits of and need for an incentive-based system for increasing the supply of kidneys.

In October of 2009, Kumud Majumder, the father of an 11-year-old son with advanced leukemia, joined a lawsuit challenging the federal ban on compensating bone-marrow donors. He wanted to save his son's life. Last week Mr. Majumder and his co-plaintiffs enjoyed a victory. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that the majority of bone-marrow donors may lawfully be compensated.

Altruism is simply not enough to satisfy the global organ shortage that has spawned illegal and unregulated organ markets, so government-sponsored compensation of healthy of individuals who are willing to give one of their kidneys is the best short-term solution.

When Altruism Isn't Enough explores the key ethical, theoretical, and practical concerns of a government-regulated donor compensation program.