The income elasticity of the value per statistical life (VSL) is an important parameter for policy analysis. Mortality risk reductions often dominate the quantified benefits of environmental and other policies, and estimates of their value are frequently transferred across countries with significantly different income levels. U.S. regulatory agencies typically assume that a 1.0 percent change in real income over time will lead to a 0.4 to 0.6 percent change in the VSL. While elasticities within this range are supported by substantial research, they appear nonsensical if applied to populations with significantly smaller incomes. When transferring values between high and lower income countries, analysts often instead assume an elasticity of 1.0, but the resulting VSL estimates appear large in comparison to income. Elasticities greater than 1.0 are supported by research on the relationship between long-term economic growth and the VSL, by cross-country comparisons, and by new research that estimates the VSL by income quantile. Caution is needed when applying these higher elasticities, however, because the resulting VSLs appear smaller than expected future earnings or consumption in some cases, contrary to theory. In addition to indicating the need for more research, this comparison suggests that, in the interim, VSL estimates should be bounded below by estimates of future income or consumption.

Examination of estimates of the income elasticity of the value of a statistical life based on international stated preference studies yields an average between 0.94 and 1.05 overall and 0.65 and 0.80 after controlling for covariates. Quantile regression estimates indicate that the income elasticity is about 0.55 for more affluent countries and 1.0 for lower income nations, i.e., those countries that have estimates of the value of a statistical life below $2 million or per capita income levels below $3212. The estimates distinguish the values of the income elasticity across country either by income level or by the value of a statistical life. These elasticities are similar to those found in revealed preference labor market studies. The estimates are robust, controlling for possible sample selection bias and the influence of covariates, such as the type of risk.

Extrapolation of estimates of the value per statistical life (VSL) from high- to low- or middle-income populations requires attention to the possible effects of differences in income, current mortality risk, health, life expectancy, and many other factors. The standard theoretical model of VSL implies that VSL increases with income and decreases with current mortality risk. The effect of mortality risk is likely to be negligible while the effect of income is large and poorly quantified. Effects of differences in life expectancy and health are theoretically ambiguous. Effects of other factors, including differences in health care, formal and informal support networks, and cultural or religious factors that affect preferences for spending on oneself or others may be important but are unknown. Practical issues include choice of the most appropriate measure of income and possible differences in the patterns of age dependence between populations.

The value of small changes in mortality risks, generally expressed as the value per statistical life, is an important parameter in benefit-cost analysis. However, little is known about the values held by populations in low- and middle-income countries. This article introduces a symposium that includes three additional articles which explore related theory and research.

Countries throughout the world use estimates of the value of a statistical life (VSL) to monetize fatality risks in benefit-cost analyses. However, the vast majority of countries lack reliable revealed preference or stated preference estimates of the VSL. This article proposes that the best way to calculate a population-average VSL for countries with insufficient or unreliable data is to transfer a base VSL from the United States calculated using labor market estimates from Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries data, coupled with adjustments for differences in income between the United States and the country of interest. This approach requires estimation of two critical inputs: a base U.S. VSL and the income elasticity of the VSL. Drawing upon previous meta-analyses that include adjustments for publication selection biases, we adopt a base VSL of $9.6 million. We utilize a sample of 953 VSL estimates from 68 labor market studies of the VSL covering fourteen lower-middle income to high income nations. We estimate the income elasticity of the VSL within the United States to be from 0.5 to 0.7 and to be just above 1.0 for non-U.S. countries. Quantile regression reveals that much of the disparity in income elasticities is attributable to income differences between the United States and other countries, as the income elasticity increases for lower income populations. Using income classifications from the World Bank, we calculate average VSLs in lower income, lower-middle income, upper-middle income, and upper income countries to be $107,000, $420,000, $1.2 million, and $6.4 million, respectively. We also present VSL estimates for all 189 countries for which World Bank income data are available, yielding a VSL range from $45,000 to $18.3 million.

Meta-analysis is used to quantitatively summarize previous studies of residential electricity demand to determine if there are factors that systematically affect estimated elasticities. In this study, price and income elasticities of residential demand for electricity from previous studies are used as the dependent variables, with data characteristics, model structure, and estimation technique as independent variables, using both least square estimation of a semilog model and maximum likelihood estimation of a gamma model. The findings of this research can help better inform public policy makers, regulators, and utilities about the responsiveness of residential electricity consumers to price and income changes.

The ecological footprint (EF) can be used to investigate relationships between population, environment and development. In China, the per caput EF is estimated to have increased by 83% between 1981 (0.82 ha caput-1) and 2000 (1.49 ha caput-1), to about 1.31 times China's area (including its oceanic territory), while the ecological deficit increased from 0.066 ha caput-1 in 1981 to 0.735 ha caput-1 in 2000. Over this period, the proportions of six sub-footprint types have changed considerably: the percentages of arable, fossil energy and forest land decreased from 44.8%, 41.5% and 4.1% to 27.1%, 40.1% and 3.0%, respectively; while sea, pasture and built-up land percentages increased from 3.8%, 4.4% and 1.3% to 15.2%, 12.4% and 2.2%, respectively. The production coefficients of gross domestic product (GDP) to the EF of China increased from 584 RMB ha-1 in 1981, to 1522 RMB ha-1 in 2000, reflecting an increasing efficiency in resource use. The EF correlates positively with disposable income and expenditure, which can be described by income and expenditure elasticity. Some measures are suggested to decrease the Chinese ecological deficit on the road to sustainability.

Although in the western world there has been a long term decline in the consumption of eggs, Asian egg consumption is on an upward trend, even in developed Asian nations like Japan. However, the latter part of the 1990s has seen a slower rate of growth in consumption. This study represents an attempt to analyse the present state of affairs by estimating the income elasticity of demand for eggs in selected countries. The annual increase in the consumption of eggs is high because of the very low consumption in developing countries. Production is also on the increase as a result of improvements in local breeds and the ready availability of high yielding birds even in rural areas. Based on estimates, countries were categorised into three groups – those of high income elasticity (Malaysia, China), medium elasticity (Sri Lanka, Pakistan) and low elasticity (Japan, Korea). Increasing disposable household income will continue to result in an expansion in the production and consumption of eggs in Asia. By the year 2010 over 60% of the world's population will live in Asia; furthermore, the growth in disposable income and purchasing power coupled with rapidly changing food habits will make eggs one of the more popular protein-rich foods with both the rural and urban populations in Asia.