Ultimate Price: The Value We Place on Life

Howard Steven Friedman

Univ of California Press, May 5, 2020 - Business & Economics - 232 pages

How much is a human life worth? Individuals, families, companies, and governments routinely place a price on human life. The calculations that underlie these price tags are often buried in technical language, yet they influence our economy, laws, behaviors, policies, health, and safety. 

These price tags are often unfair, infused as they are with gender, racial, national, and cultural biases that often result in valuing the lives of the young more than the old, the rich more than the poor, whites more than blacks, Americans more than foreigners, and relatives more than strangers. This is critical since undervalued lives are left less-protected and more exposed to risk.

Howard Steven Friedman explains in simple terms how economists and data scientists at corporations, regulatory agencies, and insurance companies develop and use these price tags and points a spotlight at their logical flaws and limitations. He then forcefully argues against the rampant unfairness in the system. Readers will be enlightened, shocked, and, ultimately, empowered to confront the price tags we assign to human lives and understand why such calculations matter.

Contents

• 1 Your Money or Your Life?: 1
• 2 When the Towers Fell: 6
• 3 Justice Is Not Blind: 29
• 4 A Little More Arsenic in Your Water: 50
• 5 Maximizing Profits at Whose Expense?: 72
• 6 I Want to Die the Way Grandpa Did: 95
• 7 To Be Young Again: 109
• 8 Can We Afford a Little One?: 132
• 9 Broken Calculators: 151
• 10 Whats Next?: 170
• Notes: 179
• Further Reading: 213
• Acknowledgments: 215
• Index: 217

About the author

Howard Steven Friedman, a leading statistician and health economist, is an expert in data science and applications of cost-benefit analysis. He teaches at Columbia University.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Ultimate Price: The Value We Place on Life
• Author: Howard Steven Friedman
• Publisher: Univ of California Press, 2020
• ISBN: 0520974689, 9780520974685
• Length: 232 pages
• Subjects: Business & Economics / Economics / General; Business & Economics / Insurance / Health; Political Science / Public Policy / Social Policy