Large disparities between willingness to accept (WTA) and willingness to pay (WTP) based values of statistical life are commonly encountered in empirical studies. Standard economic theory suggests that if a public good is easily substitutable there should be no marked disparity between WTA and WTP values for the good, though the disparity increases with reduced substitutability. However, psychologists have shown that people often treat gains and losses asymmetrically and tend to require a substantially larger increase in wealth to compensate for a loss than the amount they would be willing to pay for an equivalent gain. Although most transport projects may aim to improve safety, situations arise when a relaxation of an existing regulation saves resources but increases the risk of death and injuries. A survey was recently carried out in New Zealand to determine people’s willingness to pay to reduce road risks and their willingness to accept compensation for an increase in risk. This paper reports the disparity observed between the two measures and considers some of the problems posed for policymakers. Copyright Springer 2005safety policy, willingness to accept disparity,
Compliance is a policy issue in the quality use of medicine that has attracted much interest; however, there is little research about medication compliance issues in people of non-English speaking backgrounds. This paper describes a qualitative data collection that was used to identify compliance issues, and possible approaches to these issues, in an area of South-Eastern Sydney with a high non-English speaking population. Two parallel, iterative, series of GP and consumer focus groups were held in Arabic and Chinese communities. Later focus groups built on the findings of earlier groups and sought to engage GPs and consumers in identifying issues in compliance, and possible approaches to these issues. The paper compares and contrasts the results from these two communities and suggests that the approach might be used to identify compliance issues in other communities. Communication around appropriate medication use was the key issue common to both communities. The Chinese community was otherwise much more critical of Western medicine than the Arahic community, perhaps because of the strength of traditional medicine in that culture.
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