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Mini: The Value of Human Life · Why We Do What We Do

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we Do what we Do? Welcome
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: to Why we Do what we Do Mini. I'm your host, Abraham,
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: and I'm your show Shane. Did you say show?
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I think I said something, so I'm okay. What I
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: meant to say For those of you who are listening,
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  Speaker 2: I meant to say, I'm your one of your hosts, Shane.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, great psychology podcast. And this is a small bite
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  Speaker 1: sized version of an episode that we do where we
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  Speaker 1: talk briefly about a thing and it's called the Mini.
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  Speaker 1: So we are talking about calculating the value of a
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  Speaker 1: human life. And there are a couple of ways that
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  Speaker 1: this has been done. There's sort of some formulas around these.
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  Speaker 1: I know it's kind of a grim, morbid topic and
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  Speaker 1: one that it kind of is a little upsetting, but
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  Speaker 1: we're gonna want to do our best to unpack it today.
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  Speaker 1: And one of the I found this really gross website
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  Speaker 1: that was an insurance website of all the horrible places
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  Speaker 1: to find information on what should be the value of
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  Speaker 1: human life, and they use what they call the human
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  Speaker 1: life value or HLV. And I also found what maybe
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  Speaker 1: is a precursor to this, which was the value of
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  Speaker 1: statistical life or VSL, but they're the same sort of idea.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, if this isn't late stage capitalism, I don't know
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  Speaker 2: what is right, So yeah, it's it's rough, So okay,
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  Speaker 2: So the HLV or the VSL. We'll go with HLV
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  Speaker 2: for now. There's a specific formula that we found on
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  Speaker 2: an insurance website that boldly lays out the steps for
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  Speaker 2: calculating the value of human life. And the value of
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  Speaker 2: human life is determined by these things. One income and
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  Speaker 2: potential growth. Two their living expenses, whatever that is, and
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  Speaker 2: then their dependence financial needs. Are just three of the
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  Speaker 2: factors they look at.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, three more are debt and liabilities, how much debt
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  Speaker 1: you have and whatnot. Making sure that you adjust your
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  Speaker 1: calculation for inflation for the value of human life. And
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  Speaker 1: then it's important to discount the value of potential future
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  Speaker 1: earnings against other factors, as what someone makes now will
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  Speaker 1: be worth less in the future, what they own now
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  Speaker 1: will be worth less in the future, so you need
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  Speaker 1: to have a discount built into the formula for calculating
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  Speaker 1: the value of that person's life.
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  Speaker 2: I think of specifically debt and liabilities. I think about
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  Speaker 2: like what my own life would cost and the I
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  Speaker 2: think it's gotten better, but if you valued it like
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  Speaker 2: in my twenties, it would have.
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  Speaker 3: Been a nightmare.
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  Speaker 1: Negative ten thousand dollars.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, just so much risk.
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  Speaker 2: I feel like the guys on Jackass probably like they
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  Speaker 2: have they probably have like a net worth, but like
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  Speaker 2: their HLV is very, very low because like they've spent
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  Speaker 2: millions of dollars on like concussion remedies and stuff.
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  Speaker 1: Fair fair Yeah, oh all right. When they do these calculations,
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  Speaker 1: they basically come up with a number, So they're trying
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  Speaker 1: to figure out, essentially, what is what does a human
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  Speaker 1: life cost? And I think part of what I wanted
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  Speaker 1: to do in this episode is figure out it is
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  Speaker 1: to bring up the idea that like someone even tried
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  Speaker 1: to put a price tag on this in the first place,
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  Speaker 1: and ultimately someone I read in one place they make
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  Speaker 1: the point like we kind of do these calculations a
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  Speaker 1: lot intrinsically, we're sort of deciding, we're making decisions for ourselves,
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  Speaker 1: like where we spend our time and the things that
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  Speaker 1: we do, and like would you trade your life for money?
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  Speaker 3: And anyway, this.
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  Speaker 1: Calculation for a government or insurance companies, they sort of
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  Speaker 1: came out to a range of what a human life
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  Speaker 1: is worth and its contribution to the economy of a government.
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  Speaker 1: Again late stage capitalism, just ripping the throat out from
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  Speaker 1: under you and watching you bleed to death. And there
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  Speaker 1: was a couple of different ways they sliced this, but
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  Speaker 1: in the United States and really most other liberal democracies,
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  Speaker 1: what they found is the value of human life could
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  Speaker 1: range anywhere from about one million to ten million dollars.
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  Speaker 1: They actually sort of put it generally on the higher
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  Speaker 1: end of that spectrum, so sort of like around ten
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  Speaker 1: million is a number I saw a lot.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I'm worth more, but that's fine. They
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  Speaker 2: did find though, that there was at least fifteen percent
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  Speaker 2: less value in dictatorships, right, So they found that like
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  Speaker 2: people's like life value decreased by fifteen percent.
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  Speaker 3: Or more if they were living in a dictatorship.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Essentially, Yeah, you just figure that whatever a human
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  Speaker 1: life is worth that then becomes a dictatorship, or if
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  Speaker 1: it was started in a dictatorship, it is worth less
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  Speaker 1: than it would be in a liberal democracy. Is the
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  Speaker 1: sort of the output of that study that I found. Yeah, okay,
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  Speaker 1: so there's a lot of other factors here. I think
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  Speaker 1: there's this risk benefit thing. How much is it worth
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  Speaker 1: investing in someone to ensure that they stay alive and healthy.
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  Speaker 1: How much would you be willing to trade your life for?
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  Speaker 1: How much does it cost to take someone's life? And so,
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  Speaker 1: looking at prison numbers, I thought this was an interesting
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  Speaker 1: way to try and sort of extrapolate out some value
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  Speaker 1: of like how people would go about calculating human life.
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  Speaker 1: And it costs a little over six hundred thousand dollars
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  Speaker 1: to incarcerate someone for about forty years, and so we're
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  Speaker 1: looking at probably at the time they're going to prison,
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  Speaker 1: that's most of the rest of their life. And I'm
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  Speaker 1: sure you can push that up, would say, would make
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  Speaker 1: it sixty years or seventy years, whatever, and you can
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  Speaker 1: sort of push that number up from six hundred thousand
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  Speaker 1: on up. But it costs over one point five million
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  Speaker 1: dollars to execute someone, and actually in Florida, their estimate
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  Speaker 1: was that it costs three point two million dollars or
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  Speaker 1: more to execute someone. So it costs six times the
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  Speaker 1: amount of money to execute someone by the government than
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  Speaker 1: it does to incarcerate them for their entire life.
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  Speaker 2: First of all, that's just terrible, but I so for
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  Speaker 2: those of you who don't know about Florida law and
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  Speaker 2: kind of how that works.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, first and foremost. Yeah, I know it's loose.
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  Speaker 1: It's a loose set of laws down here in US
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  Speaker 1: sale I guess it's no books.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's no books. Yeah, we don't have books, so
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  Speaker 3: we have to record everything somehow.
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  Speaker 1: You can't say the word gay, We can't see the
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  Speaker 1: word gay.
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  Speaker 3: It's it's really complicated here.
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  Speaker 2: But as far as Florida laws go, in like capital punishment,
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  Speaker 2: we do have lethal injection here, but most of that
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  Speaker 2: money is spent on alligator trainers because most of our
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  Speaker 2: execution kind of the process that they just toss somebody
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  Speaker 2: into an alligator pit and let them have it. So
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  Speaker 2: a lot I have to train the alligators. They have
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  Speaker 2: to make sure they're fed and kept up. They have
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  Speaker 2: to keep the enclosures have to be well kept. They
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  Speaker 2: can't let those fall apart and let those gait is loose.
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  Speaker 2: So that's a lot of the budget for that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a gruesome way to go.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's pretty rough. They could just throw them in
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  Speaker 2: the everglades. They gus toss them in straight away, and
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  Speaker 2: I'll just do that. But you know, they I think
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  Speaker 2: they want not the snakes.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I would be more okay with like having
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  Speaker 1: my body be food for animals, but I'd rather not
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  Speaker 1: be alive during that part of it.
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  Speaker 3: Sure, it's a reasonable request anyway.
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  Speaker 1: I'd also rather not be alive during ads. All right,
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  Speaker 1: we only take one click? Quick ad break during me
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  Speaker 1: is not a big deal, okay. So other ways to
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  Speaker 1: slice up sort of the value of human life. One
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  Speaker 1: factor that someone might consider is just how much someone's
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  Speaker 1: going to make in their entire life in terms of
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  Speaker 1: money earned from jobs, and the average assuming a fifty
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  Speaker 1: thousand dollars year salaries, about average is that someone will
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  Speaker 1: make about one point seven million dollars over the course
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  Speaker 1: of their life. And so you could then potentially calculate
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  Speaker 1: my life as then worth one point seven million dollars
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  Speaker 1: if you're into that sort of thing.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess if you're like interested in like valuing
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  Speaker 2: your life as productivity or something like that, Depending on
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  Speaker 2: where you live and how much you make and what
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  Speaker 2: you choose to eat, you will spend over four hundred
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  Speaker 2: thousand dollars on groceries in a lifetime. So all of
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  Speaker 2: that value is just going right back into public.
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  Speaker 1: Sure, or Walmart or wherever it is your buying groceries.
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  Speaker 1: I guess Costco, probably Wegmans anyway. So yeah, so I
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  Speaker 1: think you know, considering food that you spend, that could
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  Speaker 1: be another way that you slice it up. I think
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  Speaker 1: you could consider what it costs to have a funeral.
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  Speaker 1: That could be a thing to consider. And then, as
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  Speaker 1: I said, if you are too curious about you, Shane,
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  Speaker 1: like if someone were to offer you a dollar amount
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  Speaker 1: and say, if you agree to let me kill you,
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  Speaker 1: I will give your family this much money. How much
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  Speaker 1: money in your mind would that be worth?
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  Speaker 3: Oh my god, I think for my family, priceless.
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  Speaker 1: I think they'd agree.
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  Speaker 2: I feel like for me, if that were the case,
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  Speaker 2: it would have to be enough for like generational wealth. Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: Like it had to be like I would want to
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  Speaker 2: make sure that like everybody was taken care of for
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  Speaker 2: like at least until the sun explodes.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, so a few trillion dollars at least at
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  Speaker 1: least at least and lots of investments.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah you know, give me a planet.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, going Mormon on me.
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  Speaker 2: Huh, listen, I can get start somewhere. I'll be your
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  Speaker 2: John Smith baby.
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  Speaker 1: I mean I feel similarly, like, it'd be hard for
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  Speaker 1: me to be willing to relinquish my life without feeling
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  Speaker 1: like I was leaving. The people behind me set up
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  Speaker 1: pretty well, and I think most of them would not
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  Speaker 1: be willing to say, like, yeah, you can go ahead
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  Speaker 1: and kill that guy as long as we get paid. Like,
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  Speaker 1: I think most of the people that around me wouldn't
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  Speaker 1: make that trade, I hope, but that definitely has happened
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  Speaker 1: in some cases. But we're not a true crime podcast,
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  Speaker 1: so we won't go down that rabbit hole and not
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  Speaker 1: yet indeed. But you know, I think the whole exercise
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  Speaker 1: to me, I think the one person pointed out like
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  Speaker 1: it sounds brutal to do this calculation, and I kind
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  Speaker 1: of feel like, here is my thinking on this. I'm like,
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  Speaker 1: let's say people always talk about someone's net worth. The
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  Speaker 1: wealthiest person in the world, Jeff Bezos ERTs something, and
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  Speaker 1: they say, like, what is their net worth? And they
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  Speaker 1: calculate all their assets and what they have liquid and
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  Speaker 1: how much their companies make and that sort of thing,
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  Speaker 1: and they come up with this huge dollar figure. It's
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  Speaker 1: billions and billions of dollars, and I'm like, that person's
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  Speaker 1: life is not inherently more important than another person's life.
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  Speaker 1: It's just not like they happen to have gotten lucky
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  Speaker 1: and found themselves in a place where they got really wealthy.
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  Speaker 1: But their life, the reason to live it, their reason
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  Speaker 1: to get up every morning, the reason to do their job,
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  Speaker 1: is not more valuable than a homeless person who's hooked
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  Speaker 1: on heroin. It's not right, it's just not I'm not
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  Speaker 1: willing to say that we can put any kind of
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  Speaker 1: qualifiers in place to someone's life as being more worthwhile
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  Speaker 1: than in other's. And so if we can assign any
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  Speaker 1: kind of value to these billionaires to what their net
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  Speaker 1: worth is, then I think that becomes everyone's value. My
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  Speaker 1: life is worth the same amount that Jeff Bezo's life
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  Speaker 1: is worth, and then like everybody, everybody I think falls
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  Speaker 1: into that category. And then we start then making different
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  Speaker 1: calculations about how we spend those lives, right, because if
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  Speaker 1: we consider that every life that is lost due to
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  Speaker 1: something stupid like a war or famine, or a reckless
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  Speaker 1: incident with government officials making bad choices, or even just
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  Speaker 1: reckless incidents of people making mistakes, like then we start
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  Speaker 1: considering that like we can't accept that building shoddy planes.
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  Speaker 1: Is like, there's no amount of money that building shoddy
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  Speaker 1: planes is an excuse for. There's no amount of money
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  Speaker 1: that isn't worth it to invest in people who are
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: suffering from addiction disorders, who at risk of overdose. There
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  Speaker 1: is an amount of money that is not worth the
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  Speaker 1: palliat of care to keep someone alive and and happy
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  Speaker 1: and healthy as long as humanly possible, who maybe is
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  Speaker 1: suffering from some kind of disease, and less the amount
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  Speaker 1: of money is worth the most valuable amount of money
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  Speaker 1: that anyone has ever been assigned ever, right because like
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  Speaker 1: the no one's life is inherently more valuable than others. Anyway,
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  Speaker 1: that's my big soak box on this. And if we're
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  Speaker 1: going to design a dollary value, that's how I would
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  Speaker 1: do it.
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  Speaker 2: Those are all excellent points. And I think that you
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  Speaker 2: and I have the same value on this, which is
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  Speaker 2: and I think it's important to understand where this even
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: comes from, right Like, I made the joke about this
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  Speaker 2: being late stage capitalism, but ultimately this is the reason
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  Speaker 2: that we are looking at the value of a human
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  Speaker 2: life in dollar amounts is because of capitalism and productivity,
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  Speaker 2: right Like, that's part of where this is coming from.
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  Speaker 2: Like what you described was productivity, assets, all those things
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  Speaker 2: which are often indicators of somebody's value of life. And
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  Speaker 2: I think that if we I think it's important to
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  Speaker 2: know that that's an implicit bias that all of us
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  Speaker 2: have kind of inherited as part of growing up in
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  Speaker 2: a capitalistic society. They're easy to accept that somebody's life
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  Speaker 2: is worth x, Y and z, or why we value
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  Speaker 2: or put billionaires up on a certain pedestal, or we
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  Speaker 2: look at network is a thing that's like an important measure,
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: and we look at all that stuff because we live
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  Speaker 2: in a world where money I believe, if I'm not mistaken,
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  Speaker 2: it was the Wu Tang clan that said this best
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  Speaker 2: cash rules everything around me. And as a result of that,
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  Speaker 2: nice you know, we live in a world right where
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  Speaker 2: like money is such a predominant thing that it makes
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  Speaker 2: sense that we have developed systems to value life based
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  Speaker 2: on the dollar. When the truth is when we base
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  Speaker 2: life val based on like ethics and morals, then we
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  Speaker 2: would value every life equally.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't think Wu Tang clan was going to
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  Speaker 1: make an appearance here, but I'm happy that they did.
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  Speaker 1: That's what I have you for?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, the little things.
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  Speaker 1: You know your life is worth, how much you are
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  Speaker 1: loved by those around you, and even for those who
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: have little of that in their lives, their life is
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  Speaker 1: still meaningful and should not be discounted. So that's where
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: we're at. Yep, one hundred percent the most hopeful end ever.
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  Speaker 1: Anything else you need to add before.
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  Speaker 3: We wrap up here, No, I think that covers it.
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  Speaker 1: That's how you countulate a human life. Why we do
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: what we do Mini is out. See ya listening to
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: Why we Do what we do?
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: Send other episodes by going to WWDWWD podcast dot
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: Com and we hope you have an awesome day