Answer to Question 1
Optimization is a good description of almost all human behavior, but this doesn't mean that people are always perfect calculators. Our decisions are roughly equal to the choices we would make if we always optimized. To an economist, optimization is a good approximation of the decisions that people make.
Answer to Question 2
The value of a statistical life is the implied value of life from individual choices between options with different but small probabilities of fatality risk.Put another way, it is the money value of a human life saved, or the economic value of reducing risks to life through policy decisions. This can be inferred from the decisions of governments and consumers.However, the value of a statistical lifeis not intended to be seen as a price tag on human life. Rather, it is useful to policymakers in making decisions about which public projectsroads, bridges, damsto undertake.As such, it can be employed as the basis of cost-benefit analysis, as well as in deciding how much people need to be compensated for certain risks that they take.
A-head: ECONOMIC TOOLS TO VALUE HUMAN LIFE
Concept: Value of a statistical life
Monstrous people from distant lands depicted in a fifteenth-century European woodcut.
Principle of Reversibility
Healthier choices can be made when time is taken to read a nutrition label.
Stand over a rocker base to make weight shifts.
How People Match Their Goals to Their Means
Societal pressure to be thin can cause people to feel fat