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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Jytte Seested NielsenORCiD, Professor Susan ChiltonORCiD
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Many public policies directly affect an individual's mortality risk. The value of longevity gains has traditionally been monetized through three different concepts: value per statistical life (VSL), value per statistical life year (VSLY), and willingness-to-pay for a quality-adjusted life year (WTP–QALY). By adopting gains in life expectancy as the unifying metric and combining it with preference-based information on health and longevity, we set out an approach that would generate three measures that are conceptually linked at the individual level. In particular, explicitly integrating preferences over health impacts would allow for the WTP–QALY to be estimated alongside the VSL and VSLY. We argue that our approach has advantages over the direct and modeling methods developed in the literature to date. In addition, we clarify how using the proposed framework could deliver values allowing for consistent decision-making across policy domains and government departments in ex ante regulatory assessment while simultaneously honoring the different empirical estimation practices across government departments.
Author(s): Nielsen JS, Chilton S, McDonald R
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Risk Analysis
Year: 2026
Volume: 46
Issue: 4
Print publication date: 01/04/2026
Online publication date: 14/03/2026
Acceptance date: 04/02/2026
Date deposited: 09/03/2026
ISSN (print): 0272-4332
ISSN (electronic): 1539-6924
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/risa.70221
DOI: 10.1111/risa.70221
Data Access Statement: No data were collected for the preparation of this perspective.
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