Debate over value of a statistical life

Debate over value of a statistical life

This information was presented in the full Second Assessment Report, however, dispute arose over the Report's Summary for Policymakers. The Summary for Policymakers (SPM) is prepared with the input of government delegates and IPCC experts. Governments were unhappy with thevaluation of human life, and this was implied in the SPM. , the IPCC convening lead author who oversaw the relevant chapter of the Report, officially dissented on this summary, commenting that:

The relevant chapter [of the Report] values of statistical life based on actual studies in different countries. Whether the values used remain as in Chapter 6 or whether a common global average is used makes no difference to the results. What the authors of Chapter 6 did not accept, and still do not accept, was the call from a few [government] delegates for a common valuation based on the highest number for willingness to pay.

The Second Assessment Report was controversial in its treatment of the economic value of human life In environmental economics, it is customary to value the health impacts of climate change on the basis of willingness to pay for. An advantage of this method is that health risks of climate change are treated like any other health risk. Some have commented on the difficultly of calculating the costs of climate change impacts such as human mortality. For example, in calculations based on risk reduction, the value of a statistical life is assessed to be much higher in rich countries than in poor countries.