EPA = ECONOMIC PROTECTION AGENCY

IN A TYPICAL TRUMP MIDDLE FINGER TO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC, the hitherto “Environmental Protection Agency Has Stopped Estimating the Dollar Value of Lives Saved in the Cost-Benefit Analyses for New Pollution,” this, described by Maxine Joselow in The New York Times, January 21, 2026.

Joselow writes, “Government officials have long grappled with a question that seems like the purview of philosophers: What is the value of a human life? Under both Democratic and Republican administrations, the answer has been in the millions of dollars. The higher the value, the more the government has required businesses to spend on their operations to prevent a single death.”

“But,” she observes, “for the first time ever, at the Environmental Protection Agency the answer is effectively zero dollars. Last week, the E.P.A. stopped estimating the monetary value of lives saved when setting limits on two of the most widespread deadly air pollutants, fine particulate matter and ozone. Instead, the agency is calculating only the costs to companies of complying with pollution regulations.”

Thus, my title above.

Ironic Background. This is particularly ironic in that it was a Republican president, Richard M. Nixon, who established the Environmental Projection Agency back on July 9, 1970. He proclaimed, “The Congress, the Administration and the public all share a profound commitment to the rescue of our natural environment, and the preservation of the Earth as a place both habitable by and hospitable to man.”

What noble intentions. And how quaint in putting Congress first, if at all.

Weighing the Costs. Joselow notes, “It’s a drastic change to the way the government weighs the costs of curbing air pollution against the benefits to public health and the environment. It could lead to looser controls on pollutants from coal-burning power plants, oil refineries, steel mills and other industrial sites across the country, resulting in dirtier air.”

She continues, “For the past 30 years, the E.P.A. has pegged the value of a statistical life at around $11.7 million. Although experts have recommended increasing the value, the agency has updated the metric only to account for inflation and wage growth.” 

Joselow adds on a philosophical note, “Some critics have raised moral objections to using the tool at all, saying a human life is priceless. But supporters say its use has helped prevent hundreds of thousands of premature deaths from air pollution, which kills more Americans each year than vehicle crashes.”

PM2.5 and Ozone. “The biggest driver of those deaths,” Joselow maintains, “is fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, which refers to particles less than 2.5 micrometers in diameter, small enough to enter the bloodstream. Another silent killer is ozone, a smog-causing gas that forms when emissions from power plants, factories and vehicles mix in the air on hot, sunny days. A robust body of research has linked long-term exposure to both pollutants to premature death as well as asthma, dementia, and heart and lung disease. Even moderate exposure to PM2.5 can damage the lungs about as much as smoking, studies show.”

Undercutting Gains. Joselow writes, “Michael Greenstone, an environmental economist at the University of Chicago, said the change could result in dirtier air, undercutting the gains made since Congress strengthened the Clean Air Act in 1970. Steep reductions in PM2.5 pollution have added 1.4 years to the average American’s life expectancy since 1970, according to research by the University of Chicago’s Air Quality Life Index project.”

She quotes Dr. Greenstone: “Clean air is one of the great success stories of government policy in the last half-century. And at the heart of the Clean Air Act is the idea that when you allow people to lead longer and healthier lives, that has value that can be measured in dollars.”

Just Whose Lives Are Worth Saving? Another Republican View. “In 2003,” Joselow recounts, “during George W. Bush’s first term, the White House proposed that the E.P.A. use a 37 percent lower value of a statistical life for people older than 70. But the backlash was intense: Older Americans and environmentalists protested what they called a “senior death discount” at E.P.A. hearings. The AARP, a nonprofit group that advocates on behalf of older Americans, ran ads featuring an older woman with a ‘37 percent off!’ tag hanging from her glasses.” 

Good for AARP!!

Joselow also cites, “The American Petroleum Institute, a trade group for major oil and gas companies, has urged the E.P.A. to consider using a lower value for older people. In a 2018 public comment, the group wrote that most of the lives saved by stronger ozone standards would be ‘among the elderly population—not individuals in their highest earning years.’ ”

Geez. Where’s my middle finger when I need it? ds

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2026 

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