A historic reconstruction of research on the economic valuation of road safety as a scientific research programme

A single monetary value of a human life does not exist. Attempts to value the saving of a humna life have in the past nearly fifty years been based on the willingness-to-pay approach. Very many studies have been made to determine willingness to pay for a reduced risk of death or health impairments. The results of these studies vary enormously. The project has reconstrucyted the history of research on the monetary valuation of human life by relying on the methodology of scientific research programmes, as developed by Imre Lakatos. This theory was found to be eminently suitable to the task of reconstructing research on the monetary valuation of human life. It explains how research in a field can continue despite the fact taht results vary enormous and apparently contradict the theoretical foundations of research. Valuation research fits this description. Attempts to explain the enormous diversity of results have found that it is only partly related to factors that, according to economic theory, ought to produce variation in willingness to pay. In response to this, a recent trend has been to reformulate the relevant part of economic theory, so that findings that were long held to be anomalous are no longer regarded as that. The reformulation of theory has now gone so far as to permit almost any finding. There is no pattern of results that falsify the theoretical foundations. This means taht there is also not theoretical foundation for preferring some esyimates to others. In this sense, research on the monetary value of human life has reached an end: It started out with the objective of finding a specific value. When it was realised that such a value does not exist, theory was reformulated to permit a multiplicity of value of human life to exist. One might think that valuation research would be given up, since it does not produce a single value for use in cost-benefit analyses. But this research continues and new estimates of the value of human life are published frequently.

Research for the purpose of obtaining monetary valuations of improved transport safety has a history of more than 50 years. The research was originally based on the so-called human capital approach, but around 1970 it was realised that this approach was b oth empirically and theoretically unsatisfactory. From about 1980, research designed to provide monetary valuations of transport safety has been based on the willingness-to-pay approach. There is wide agreement among economists that this is the only corre ct theoretical foundation for this research. Empirical research to determine willingness-to-pay for improved transport safety has run into a host of problems. Not all of these problems have been solved, although research has been going on for more than 3 0 years. There are strong indications that the phenomenon research aims to describe - well-ordered preferences for the provision of transport safety - simply does not exist. There is little reason to doubt that most people want to improve transport safety , and would be willing to pay something for such improvements. However, the valuation tasks given to people to elicit their willingness-to-pay are too complex and based on too strong assumptions about rationality to function as intended. The results of th e empirical studies are therefore, to a large extent, artifacts of the methodology. The history of valuation research has a number of characteristics that resemble a scientific research programme, as outlined by philosopher Imre Lakatos. According to his description of a scientific research programme, it can continue to exist and flourish even if many results of research apparently contradict the theoretical core of the programme. Lakatos refers to such results as anomalies. Valuation research is charact erised by a large number of anomalous results. The project will explore whether a different approach can be taken to the monetary valuation of transport safety.