Not content with stripping Americans of every last dollar, implementing policies that funnel our wealth into the pockets of the rich at the fastest possible pace, it looks like the Bush Administration has now managed to deliver an even more blatant slap in the face to the American citizen. Yes, our very lives, the value placed on the individual human life by the government, has been reduced by nearly 15%. The EPA has just declared that an American life has declined in value, to $6.9 million in today's dollars. This is a decrease of approximately a million dollars from the value previously assigned to a "statistical", or standard, life.
The impact of this is simple to understand. If our value is less, then in cost/benefit analysis, many more of us are expendable if a new regulation or policy is being considered.
When drawing up regulations, government agencies put a value on human life and then weigh the costs versus the lifesaving benefits of a proposed rule. The less a life is worth to the government, the less the need for a regulation, such as tighter restrictions on pollution.
Consider, for example, a hypothetical regulation that costs $18 billion to enforce but will prevent 2,500 deaths. At $7.8 million per person (the old figure), the lifesaving benefits outweigh the costs. But at $6.9 million per person, the rule costs more than the lives it saves, so it may not be adopted.
Not only has the Dow dropped. Not only has the price of gas increased. Not only have our average savings shrunk and the worth of our homes begun to fall. Not only have our wages stagnated as the deficit blossomed. If ever anything was symbolic of how the current mis-administration views its citizens, it is that our lives are now available at a discounted price.
Consider, for example, a hypothetical regulation that costs $18 billion to enforce but will prevent 2,500 deaths. At $7.8 million per person (the old figure), the lifesaving benefits outweigh the costs. But at $6.9 million per person, the rule costs more than the lives it saves, so it may not be adopted.
Some environmentalists accuse the Bush administration of changing the value to avoid tougher rules — a charge the EPA denies.
"It appears that they're cooking the books in regards to the value of life," said S. William Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, which represents state and local air pollution regulators. "Those decisions are literally a matter of life and death."
The figure is not based on your value to your family or anything sentimental like that -- it's based on the amount of money you are willing to pay to avoid similar risks to your life, and how much employers are willing to pay to get you to take that risk. And with that in mind, this makes sense -- times are difficult. Reduced to economic desperation, we take more risks; we take more dangerous jobs, like cell tower repair, because of economic need. So then our value to both employers and the government decreases. Lather, rinse, repeat.
I wonder if this is the ultimate, sneaky goal of the Republicans -- not only shrink government until it can be drowned in a bathtub, but shrink the value of human life until we can be killed off whenever needed to produce the most value for shareholders?