Paying for Permanence: Public Preferences for Contaminated Site Cleanup

Arbeitspapier

We use conjoint choice questions to investigate people s preferences for income and reductions in mortality risks delivered by contaminated site remediation policies. Our survey is self-administered using the computer by residents of four cities in Italy with severely contaminated sites. We estimate the Value of a Statistical Life to be about €5.6 million for an immediate risk reduction. If the risk reduction takes place 20 years from now, however, the implied VSL is about €1.26 million. The discount rate implicit in the responses to the conjoint choice questions is about 7%. People are willing to pay for permanent risk reductions, but not just any amount. Risk reductions in the nearer future are valued more highly than risk reductions in the more distant future. We also find that the VSL is individuated, in the sense that it depends on observable individual characteristics of the respondents, familiarity with contaminated sites, concern about the health effects of exposure to toxicants, having a family member with cancer, perceived usefulness of possible government actions, and the respondent s beliefs about the goals of government remediation programs. Additional questions suggest that respondents discount lives, and do so at a discount rate in the ballpark of that implicit in their risk v. money tradeoffs.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: Nota di Lavoro ; No. 113.2006

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Value of Life; Forgone Income ; Health: Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health ; Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law ; Valuation of Environmental Effects ; Air Pollution; Water Pollution; Noise; Hazardous Waste; Solid Waste; Recycling
• Thema: Value of a Statistical Life ; Latent Risk Reductions ; Individual Discount Rates ; Conjoint Choice Questions ; Contaminated Sites ; Remediation ; Umweltsanierung ; Gesundheitsrisiko ; Willingness to pay ; Menschen ; Bewertung ; Italien ; Wert des Lebens

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Alberini, Anna ; Tonin, Stefania ; Turvani, Margherita ; Chiabai, Aline
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM)
• (wo): Milano
• (wann): 2006

Weitere Informationen

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/73979
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:44 MEZ