Retrospectives: The Cold-War Origins of the Value of Statistical Life
追溯了“统计生命价值”（VSL）的历史，它源于冷战时期兰德公司为规避飞行员生命估值而引发的争议，如今被用于拯救生命投资的成本效益分析。
This paper traces the history of the "Value of Statistical Life" (VSL), which today is used routinely in benefit-cost analysis of life-saving investments. The “value of statistical life” terminology was introduced by Thomas Schelling (1968) in his essay, “The Life You Save May Be Your Own.” Schelling made the crucial move to think in terms of risk rather than individual lives, with the hope to dodge the moral thicket of valuing "life." But as recent policy debates have illustrated, his move only thickened it. Tellingly, interest in the subject can be traced back another twenty years before Schelling's essay to a controversy at RAND Corporation following its earliest application of operations research to defense planning. RAND wanted to avoid valuing pilot's lives but the Air Force insisted they confront the issue. Thus, the VSL is not only well acquainted with political controversy; it was born from it.