Similarly the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration has imposed progressively more costly auto safety standards for twenty-five years but seems indifferent to the lives lost due to the fuel economy standards. These comparisons, and the many others documented in these articles, lead to a conclusion that a reallocation of the same level of safety expenditures could greatly increase safety. Somewhat to my surprise and disappointment, the conference did not address one major issue. Most of the papers appeared to endorse a common cost per life saved or a common benefit-cost standard for all types of risks. Only the paper by Lester Lave suggested some reservations about a general application of a benefit-cost standard to choose safety policies, but he did not develop the implications of his reservations.
Environmental pollution is an example of the first type of risk.
Risks in the workplace and home are examples of the second type of risk. And smoking, eating junk food, and not wearing a seat belt are examples of the third type of risk. There is a reasonable basis for government safety standards affecting the first type of risk, and a benefit-cost analysis is probably the best basis for setting such standard. And for my part, I strongly object to government standards affecting my choice to smoke, drink, eat, wear a seat belt or bicycle helmet, etc., where I bear the full costs of these choices. In that case, all I want from the government is succinct unbiased information about the consequences of my own choices.