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Editorial: At this rate, you'll be worth nothing by 2030
Published 12:00 am PDT Sunday, July 13, 2008
Story appeared in FORUM section, Page E6
Did you wake up last Friday feeling worthless? You're not imagining things. You may not be worthless, but you are worth less. Just ask the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
Last Thursday afternoon, the Associated Press reported that the EPA has lowered the value of a human life – any human life, including yours – to $6.9 million, down from $7.8 million per life just five years ago.
From this distance, it's not entirely clear what this devaluation reflects. Maybe it's tied to the decline in real estate values. (Everything else seems to be.) Maybe human lives have some sort of inverse relationship with oil prices. Or maybe it's simply supply and demand. The United States has about 12.2 million more people now than it did five years ago, so maybe supply has simply outstripped demand, creating a buyer's market for human lives.
You might wonder why the EPA is in the business of setting a value on human lives, which is the sort of undertaking that is usually associated with philosophers and religious leaders. The answer, from the AP: "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."
It's hard to know which is more depressing: that by lowering its estimate of the value of a human life, an arm of the federal government can clear the way for more pollution, or that everyone's life has declined in value by almost $1 million in just half a decade.
By last Friday, California's Sen. Barbara Boxer was vowing to force EPA to change its valuation. Have at it, senator. And while you're at it, can you do anything about real estate values, too?
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