Measures of Mortality Risks

W Viscusi, Jahn K Hakes and Alan Carlin

Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 1997, vol. 14, issue 3, 213-33

Abstract: Different risks of death are not equivalent because of differences in timing. This paper develops measures of mortality risks that recognize the probability of death, the duration of life lost, and the role of discounting. These adjustments lead to a substantial reordering of the major causes of death. Recognition of duration-related issues explains much of the public's misperception of mortality risk probabilities, which may reflect duration-related concerns rather than biases in risk beliefs. Our estimates suggest that in forming their risk beliefs the public discounts years of life lost at a rate from 3.3-12.4 percent. Standardization of lifetimes at risk also alters the relative efficacy of regulatory policies for which we provide a variety of cost-effectiveness measures. Copyright 1997 by Kluwer Academic Publishers

Date: 1997
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