The value of a statistical life in Chile

In this article, we estimated the value of a statistical life and the value of a statistical injury (VSI) for Chilean workers using a combination of data from the year 2006 from the Chilean National Socio-Economic Survey, which provides workers’ characteristics, and annual statistics from the Chilean Safety Association, which provide labor accident risk data. We estimated a hedonic log-wage equation taking into account of selection bias and endogeneity. The estimated value of a statistical life was US$4,625,958, which increased by almost a factor three after correcting for endogeneity (US$12,826,520). On the other hand, the estimated VSI was US$30,840. The uncorrected results were lower than the values reported by other authors for various developed countries, but greater than those estimated using indirect approaches for Chile. Copyright Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013