Should Dignity After Death Be Left to the Market?

While alive, people can avoid buying many goods. They can stay away from an overpriced restaurant and leave a mobile carrier they dislike. They can postpone a purchase, make something themselves, or travel to another area.

Death cannot be postponed.

A body cannot remain at home indefinitely; legal procedures and sanitary management are required. In a short period of profound grief, the family must decide on a funeral provider, transport, storage, the cremation schedule, and costs. In a large city, the available crematoria are limited.

In 2026, the price and governance of cremation became a major policy issue in Tokyo.

According to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, the metropolis has 26 crematoria: nine in the 23 special wards, nine in the Tama area, and eight on the islands. Seven of the nine in the wards are privately operated. Materials presented by the metropolitan government and the Association of Special Ward Mayors in June 2026 state that one private company operates six facilities and handles approximately 74,000 of the wards' 107,000 annual cremations—about 70 percent.

In April 2026, the lowest adult fee at designated private crematoria rose to ¥87,000. The wards introduced a ¥27,000 subsidy for adult residents who meet the requirements of the residents' funeral program, bringing their effective burden close to the former ¥59,600 fee.

The issue should not be reduced to “private profit is bad.” Cremation furnaces, maintenance, fuel, staff, and environmental controls all cost money. Public operation merely shifts some of those costs to taxes or other fees. Private expertise and management can contribute to stable supply.

But the familiar market answer—“If you dislike the price, choose a competitor”—also fails to fit.

The central claim of this essay is:

Cremation is a market in which options may be displayed, yet the consumer cannot exit by deciding not to buy.

I will call this an exitless market.

The relevant question is not simply the name on the operator's door, private or public. It is who guarantees a minimum of price fairness, supply, oversight, and dignity for a service that everyone may need and that few can refuse or postpone.

1. What is the problem in Tokyo's 23 wards?

Most crematoria across Japan are operated by municipalities or similar public bodies. A Tokyo survey published in March 2026 found that public crematoria often charge residents nothing or relatively little, while fees at private facilities are commonly ¥80,000 or more.

The special wards have an unusual structure. In a dense city where land and local agreement are difficult to secure, long-established private facilities have historically provided most cremations.

The metropolitan government and ward mayors reported the following approximate distribution:

• Public crematoria: 17,000 cremations
• Toda Funeral Hall: 16,000 cremations
• Tokyo Hakuzen's six halls: 74,000 cremations

These figures do not establish illegality by any company. A large market share alone does not prove that a price is unjust. Fuel, labor, capital renewal, and environmental measures all require examination as possible causes of higher fees.

Yet if cremation is highly public in character and supply is concentrated, can government simply say that it has no role because the price belongs to a private enterprise?

In 2026, Tokyo established a committee on crematoria to examine pricing, management, capacity, and administrative involvement. The debate has moved beyond a simple demand for a price cut toward the stability of urban infrastructure in a society with a rising number of deaths.

2. Is there genuine freedom of choice in cremation?

Several conditions generally help a market work well:

• Buyers can compare products and prices.
• They can refuse, postpone, or substitute when the price is too high.
• Multiple sellers exist and new firms can enter.
• Information about quality is available.
• Buyers have time and psychological space to negotiate.

All of these conditions are weak in cremation.

Demand cannot be refused

A family cannot say, “Prices are high this year, so we will wait until next year.” Death occurs independently of anyone's willingness to purchase.

Time is short

A death notification, cremation permit, transport, storage, funeral, and cremation follow one another. Comparing fee schedules and researching distant facilities is an immense burden during grief.

Substitutes are limited

Cremation is overwhelmingly common in Japan. Facilities are geographically constrained, and traveling outside the area can add transport and storage costs.

Entry is difficult

A crematorium requires land, urban-planning approval, environmental measures, local acceptance, permits, and major capital investment. A competitor cannot simply open next door as soon as prices rise.

Quality is hard to evaluate in advance

Most people do not arrange cremations frequently. The moment for a decision arrives before they have learned to assess service quality or identify what is necessary.

The transaction may formally be a contract, but the buyer's freedom is thin. That limits the fairness of treating cremation like an ordinary consumer choice for which the family bears full responsibility.

3. What is an “exitless market”?

An exitless market is one in which buyers find it difficult to refuse or postpone a service and face high costs in changing providers.

Emergency medicine, water networks, electricity grids, goods sold in detention, and necessities during disasters can share some of these features, though their institutional details differ.

The idea disrupts the simple contrast between a market that is free and government that is coercive.

In a well-functioning market, exit disciplines power. When price is high, quality poor, or explanation inadequate, customers move elsewhere. The possibility of losing them pressures a company to improve.

Where buyers cannot leave, that discipline weakens. Price transparency, licensing, a public alternative, and complaint procedures must replace some of the oversight ordinarily performed by competition.

Protecting freedom in an exitless market therefore requires more than removing regulation. Institutions must create bargaining power in place of exit.

4. Adam Smith—trusting markets is not the same as ignoring their conditions

Adam Smith is known for explaining how exchange motivated by self-interest can produce specialization and prosperity. He is often caricatured as the father of the slogan that government should do nothing and leave everything to markets.

Smith also warned that merchants and members of the same trade may combine to raise prices. He recognized public roles in education, justice, and public works that markets alone may not adequately supply.

Applied to cremation, his insight requires us to hold two ideas at once.

First, prices carry information. If fuel, wages, and repairs become more expensive, politically freezing the fee can lead to interrupted supply or decaying equipment. A cost ordered out of the visible price reappears elsewhere.

Second, we should not automatically expect a fair price where competitive conditions are weak. When entry barriers are high, buyers cannot exit, and supply is concentrated, invoking the “invisible hand” without institutional design oversimplifies Smith's analysis.

5. Michael Walzer—there are limits to the spheres money may govern

Political philosopher Michael Walzer argues that social life contains distinct spheres of value, and that an advantage obtained in one sphere should not dominate all others.

Money is a powerful means of choosing food, clothing, and entertainment. Yet a society in which it directly buys votes, judicial verdicts, academic degrees, or love seems unjust because each sphere has principles of distribution appropriate to its meaning.

Some parts of a funeral are rightly market choices. Families may choose the hall, coffin, flowers, ceremony, and waiting room according to preference and budget.

But should access to the basic tasks of handling a body safely, cremating it lawfully, and returning the remains to a family depend entirely on ability to pay?

We can divide funerary services into two layers:

• The optional ritual layer: luxury, ceremony, and additional services may be chosen in the market.
• The essential public layer: safe storage, cremation, and a minimum opportunity to say goodbye should be guaranteed to all.

The same level of expenditure need not be imposed on everyone. But if money determines whether a person can be laid to rest appropriately at all, the market sphere has expanded too far.

6. Sandel—does putting a price on something change its meaning?

Michael Sandel argues that markets do more than allocate goods. They can change what goods mean. As the domain of buying and selling expands, the problem is not only inequality but also the possible corruption of value.

Charging for cremation does not by itself commodify the dead. Staff labor, fuel, and facilities require resources. A public service that appears free is still supported by taxes.

The problem is not the existence of a price. It is a culture in which funeral rites are judged only by price.

An expensive funeral proves deeper love. A low-cost funeral shows neglect. A family unable to purchase extras should feel ashamed. When these meanings spread, the market enters the time of grief and purchasing power is confused with affection.

Government need not guarantee equal luxury. It should ensure that a basic funeral carries no social meaning of shame or humiliation, whatever its price.

7. Kant—do the dead have rights?

This raises a difficult philosophical question:

Can a dead person possess dignity or rights?

The dead have no present consciousness, do not feel pain, and cannot revise their wishes. Whether they can be bearers of rights in exactly the same way as the living is contested.

But it does not follow that handling a body carelessly harms no one.

First, the person while alive had wishes about their body, funeral, religious commitments, and family after death. Respecting those wishes treats a person's life as something that does not simply vanish at an arbitrary temporal boundary.

Second, treatment of a body matters to family and community. Carelessness can damage their relation to the person and deepen grief.

Third, the way society treats the dead conveys a message to the living. A system that says a poor person's body may be neglected, or a person without relatives may be left waiting, also denies equal standing to people who are still alive.

Applying Kant's principle against treating humanity merely as a means to a corpse requires care. Still, it gives us reason not to reduce the deceased to a disposal problem, but to recognize a person who had commitments and relationships.

8. Dignity belongs to families as well as to the dead

If cremation fees are discussed only through the dignity of the deceased, the burden on living family members disappears.

Immediately after a death, relatives are asked to make many decisions. They may contract before fully understanding the charges and discover additions later. They may feel guilty for asking about a cheaper option, as though their love were being tested.

A dignified funeral is not necessarily an elaborate one. It requires that:

• prices and necessary items are known in advance;
• no one is insulted for choosing the less expensive option;
• a minimum farewell can reflect religious and family circumstances;
• poverty does not cause the body to be handled poorly; and
• families do not have to discover subsidies by themselves while grieving.

These conditions treat relatives not as uninformed consumers to be managed, but as citizens in grief.

9. Rawls—choosing a system without knowing income or place of death

Apply John Rawls's veil of ignorance to cremation.

Suppose you do not know whether you will be:

• wealthy or receiving public assistance;
• part of a large family or without relatives;
• near a crematorium or dependent on long-distance transport;
• the deceased or the relative paying the bill;
• a crematorium employee or a municipal taxpayer; or
• someone who dies during a period of peak demand.

From this position, you would not necessarily make every cremation free. Taxes and sustainability still matter.

But you would also hesitate to choose a system in which access to basic cremation disappears because of income or geography. A rational design would guarantee a transparent basic fee, relief from excessive burden, sufficient capacity, and help with storage during delays, while allowing optional services above that baseline.

Justice does not mean that nobody pays. It means that even the least advantaged can face death and grief without humiliation.

10. Subsidies matter—but are they enough?

The subsidy introduced by the wards in April 2026 provides important immediate relief. For an adult charged ¥87,000 at a designated private crematorium, ¥27,000 can be reimbursed when the requirements are satisfied.

Several questions remain.

Eligibility conditions

Applicants must meet conditions such as using an altar or hearse voucher under the residents' funeral program. Someone who arranged a cremation quickly or did not know the program may be excluded.

Up-front payment

If reimbursement comes later, a family must first provide the full amount. The burden is heaviest for households with the least available cash.

Effects on the price structure

Publicly covering the difference can leave price-setting and concentrated supply unchanged. A subsidy may rescue users without reforming the market.

Information inequality

Those who know the program, collect documents, and file on time are most able to benefit. Application-based support in a period of grief ties a right to information-search skills.

This is not an argument against the subsidy. Urgent relief and long-term structural reform must proceed separately and together.

11. Is public operation always cheap and fair?

The claim that every crematorium should be nationalized or municipalized also deserves scrutiny.

Public crematoria face costs, land acquisition, local opposition, aging equipment, staffing, and utilization rates. If political pressure holds visible fees too low, the tax burden may become opaque or maintenance may be delayed. A public monopoly is not guaranteed to focus on users.

Conversely, private operation does not preclude public responsibility. Many infrastructures are provided privately under contracts, disclosure requirements, supervision, and duties to serve.

The relevant questions concern conditions rather than the operator's label:

• Can everyone access a basic service?
• Are the reasons for fees explained?
• Can interruptions and excessive waiting be prevented?
• Can government monitor conflicts of interest and ownership changes?
• Can users challenge decisions?
• Can capacity expand as future deaths increase?

Publicness does not mean only direct public operation. It means that society imposes necessary conditions whoever operates the facility and accepts ultimate responsibility when those conditions fail.

12. Cremation as a “public option”

A public option can preserve market choice while responding to the absence of exit.

This does not require nationalizing every facility. It means guaranteeing a basic cremation at a transparent price through a municipality or a tightly contracted provider.

With sufficient real capacity, a public option has three effects:

1. It guarantees minimum access regardless of income.
2. It creates a benchmark against which private prices can be compared.
3. It supports supply if a private operator withdraws or a disaster occurs.

A nominal option with no available reservations, or located impossibly far away, is not a choice. It must be practically usable when fees, distance, waiting time, transport, and storage are considered together.

13. Seven tests for a fair cremation system

1. Access

Can everyone obtain a basic cremation within an appropriate period regardless of income, family status, nationality, or religion?

2. Price transparency

Are cremation, storage, transport, waiting-room, and urn fees separated so that mandatory and optional items are clear?

3. A substitute for exit

For people unable to switch facilities, is there a public option, benchmark fee, price review, or subsidy?

4. Capacity

Does planning account for future mortality, disasters, furnace outages, waiting, and storage?

5. Dignity

Even under the least expensive plan, are bodies and families treated without humiliation and given a minimum chance to say goodbye?

6. Accountability

Can government and the public examine fee changes, ownership changes, conflicts of interest, and deteriorating service?

7. No-application support

Can people receive relief through linked death-registration and cremation-permit procedures, without having to discover a complex benefit themselves?

14. How can the system change?

Make costs and prices comparable

Public and private facilities should disclose basic and additional fees, operating rates, and capital investment in a common format. Legitimate commercial secrets can be protected without abandoning explanation for an essential public service.

Automate relief and reduce advance payment

Death notifications, cremation permits, and residence data can be lawfully coordinated to notify eligible families automatically. Where possible, the charge should be reduced at the point of payment so families do not have to advance funds and file later.

Plan public capacity over the long term

Planning should include renewal of existing facilities, regional cooperation, and mutual aid during disasters, not only new construction. Precisely because local opposition is predictable, the conversation must be long-term and public rather than sudden.

Impose public conditions on private providers

Licensing, contracts, subsidies, and tax arrangements can require basic service slots, advance explanation of fee changes, emergency supply, data reporting, and complaint handling.

Include the cost of waiting

A lower cremation fee does not reduce the total burden if longer waits create higher storage costs. Reservation availability, average waiting days, storage fees, and transport distance must be monitored together.

15. Conclusion—death is both private and public

Death is among the most private of losses. Family memory, religion, affection, and regret intersect within it.

It is also a public event. Recording a death, handling a body safely, managing land and environmental effects, and maintaining cremation capacity all require institutions.

Markets can generate choice, diversity, and efficiency. Government need not impose one uniform form on every funeral. Families should be free to choose ceremony, religious practice, luxury, and additional services.

But treating basic cremation as an ordinary commodity produces a contradiction: it tells people who cannot refuse death not to buy if the price is too high.

In an exitless market, freedom cannot be measured by the number of options on a list.

Freedom means not being forced into a costly contract while grieving, not losing a basic service, knowing the reasons for the price, and not having one's love questioned for choosing the less expensive arrangement.

Protecting dignity after death does not mean making every funeral elaborate.

It means guaranteeing a floor on which the death of the poorest person and the death of a person without relatives are treated not as troublesome matter for a city to dispose of, but as the end of one human life.

FAQ

Is private operation of a crematorium itself the problem?

No. A private operator can provide public infrastructure when stable supply, transparent fees, basic service, and public oversight are secured. The issue is whether an exitless market provides accountability and a meaningful alternative, not ownership alone.

Should cremation be free?

That is one possible policy, but a zero fee still shifts costs into taxation. What matters is sustainable funding, access to basic cremation regardless of ability to pay, and transparent fees and taxes.

How much is the 2026 subsidy in Tokyo's wards?

For qualifying users of the residents' funeral program who pay the lowest fee at a designated private crematorium, the upper limit is ¥27,000 for an adult and ¥15,000 for a child. Eligibility and application details should be checked on the relevant ward's official website.

Does one company's high share prove monopoly abuse or wrongdoing?

No. A high share signals a need for oversight and examination, but it does not alone prove illegality or an unjust price. Costs, entry barriers, price-setting, and capacity must be investigated concretely.

If the dead do not have rights, why discuss dignity?

The status of the dead as rights-bearers is philosophically contested. Duties of respectful treatment can still be grounded in the wishes expressed during life, the rights of relatives, communal values, and the message of equal standing that institutions send to the living.

NOW IN QUESTION

If you read a cremation fee schedule not as a calm consumer before loss, but on the day after someone you love dies—with little time, information, or alternative—can the resulting contract still be called a free choice?

References

• Crematoria in Tokyo (Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of Public Health)
• Survey of crematorium operations (Tokyo Metropolitan Government, March 31, 2026)
• Administrative involvement in changes of control at private crematoria (Association of Special Ward Mayors and Tokyo Metropolitan Government, June 4, 2026)
• Tokyo committee on crematoria (Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of Public Health)
• Residents' funeral subsidy (Shinjuku City)
• Residents' funeral assistance program (Arakawa City)
• Markets (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
• Dignity (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
• Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, 1776.
• Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 1785.
• John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, 1971.
• Michael Walzer, Spheres of Justice, 1983.
• Michael J. Sandel, What Money Can't Buy, 2012.