Revisiting EPA’s Value per Statistical Life

Maureen Cropper, Emily Joiner and Alan Krupnick

Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, 2024, vol. 18, issue 2, 193 - 211

Abstract: The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) bases its estimate of the value of statistical life (VSL) on 17 hedonic wage studies and five contingent valuation studies conducted between 1974 and 1991. We summarize advances in the mortality risk valuation literature since these papers were published, focusing on studies conducted in the United States that value risks to adults. We review hedonic wage, other revealed preference, and stated preference studies, identifying papers that satisfy appropriate validity criteria. We conclude that the recent literature is sufficiently rich to permit a revision of EPA’s baseline estimate. Importantly, VSL estimates from both the averting behavior and stated preference studies we review reflect the preferences of a wider range of demographic groups than the current VSL, and newer studies better target causes of death relevant to EPA regulations.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/730476 (application/pdf)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/730476 (text/html)
Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucp:renvpo:doi:10.1086/730476

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Review of Environmental Economics and Policy from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().