Abstract
Regulations that use or refer to the concept of 'risk' are becoming more popular with both the U.S. Congress and Government agencies -- and are often being challenged in the courts. Proponents of stronger regulation suggest that there are significant threats to life and health that receive little or no attention from both elected officials and regulators, whereas advocates of less intensive government intervention point to regulations that impose high costs with little or no benefit. Usually, both the costs and the benefits are highly uncertain. This paper assumes for the purpose of argument that both proponents and opponents can find many cases where their respective arguments have merit. We also assume that both criticisms of the status quo have a large constituency within the public. If these assumption are valid, then a policy problem is created whereby decision makers are being asked, in the face of significant uncertainty, when to regulate, and at what level of specificity to regulate. The purposes of this paper are to offer some fresh ideas about why these problems arise, shed some light on decision making within the Congress, the regulatory agencies and the courts, and offer some practical steps that could be taken
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Ettlinger, L A
[1]
- The Oxford Group, Baltimore, MD (United States)
Citation Formats
Ettlinger, L A.
Risk regulation in environment, health and safety : Decision in the face of uncertainty.
Sweden: N. p.,
1999.
Web.
Ettlinger, L A.
Risk regulation in environment, health and safety : Decision in the face of uncertainty.
Sweden.
Ettlinger, L A.
1999.
"Risk regulation in environment, health and safety : Decision in the face of uncertainty."
Sweden.
@misc{etde_20052080,
title = {Risk regulation in environment, health and safety : Decision in the face of uncertainty}
author = {Ettlinger, L A}
abstractNote = {Regulations that use or refer to the concept of 'risk' are becoming more popular with both the U.S. Congress and Government agencies -- and are often being challenged in the courts. Proponents of stronger regulation suggest that there are significant threats to life and health that receive little or no attention from both elected officials and regulators, whereas advocates of less intensive government intervention point to regulations that impose high costs with little or no benefit. Usually, both the costs and the benefits are highly uncertain. This paper assumes for the purpose of argument that both proponents and opponents can find many cases where their respective arguments have merit. We also assume that both criticisms of the status quo have a large constituency within the public. If these assumption are valid, then a policy problem is created whereby decision makers are being asked, in the face of significant uncertainty, when to regulate, and at what level of specificity to regulate. The purposes of this paper are to offer some fresh ideas about why these problems arise, shed some light on decision making within the Congress, the regulatory agencies and the courts, and offer some practical steps that could be taken to reform the present system of regulation. Our central observation is that disputes arise as to the efficacy of risk regulations (in the face of uncertainty) because of the difficulties citizens face in determining whether either those who cause risks or those who are responsible for mitigating them are acting in the citizen's best interest. These regulations contain issues which typically deal with subjects containing substantial, unresolvable technical and scientific uncertainties. Because of this inherent uncertainty, the relationships between citizens and regulators, with elected officials in the middle, becomes an especially difficult form of agent relationship. We conclude that the problems associated with this agent relationship are unlikely to be resolved solely by administrative reform, reliance on experts, or risk education because, generally, these reforms are focused strictly on narrowing the risk uncertainty. From economic principles, however, we recognize that the value of efforts to minimize this risk uncertainty (or to maximize the technical and scientific information about risks) is subject to 'diminishing marginal utility'. Thus, these efforts ultimately can be expected to become unpopular with both citizens and elected officials. We expect, therefore, that the outcome of the risk regulation debate, and ultimately environment, health and safety policy decisions, will primarily be determined by the values of the proponents and opponents as to the relative ranking of efficiency and equity. Most likely, the best means available for reforming risk regulation and making it more coherent and to avoid some of the costly mistakes of the past is to: 1. increase the resources available for identifying risks and effective responses to them, 2. build in mechanisms for informing the public that policy decisions using these regulations are value laden, and 3. publicize both the process and the outcomes of risk regulations and policy decisions.}
place = {Sweden}
year = {1999}
month = {Dec}
}
title = {Risk regulation in environment, health and safety : Decision in the face of uncertainty}
author = {Ettlinger, L A}
abstractNote = {Regulations that use or refer to the concept of 'risk' are becoming more popular with both the U.S. Congress and Government agencies -- and are often being challenged in the courts. Proponents of stronger regulation suggest that there are significant threats to life and health that receive little or no attention from both elected officials and regulators, whereas advocates of less intensive government intervention point to regulations that impose high costs with little or no benefit. Usually, both the costs and the benefits are highly uncertain. This paper assumes for the purpose of argument that both proponents and opponents can find many cases where their respective arguments have merit. We also assume that both criticisms of the status quo have a large constituency within the public. If these assumption are valid, then a policy problem is created whereby decision makers are being asked, in the face of significant uncertainty, when to regulate, and at what level of specificity to regulate. The purposes of this paper are to offer some fresh ideas about why these problems arise, shed some light on decision making within the Congress, the regulatory agencies and the courts, and offer some practical steps that could be taken to reform the present system of regulation. Our central observation is that disputes arise as to the efficacy of risk regulations (in the face of uncertainty) because of the difficulties citizens face in determining whether either those who cause risks or those who are responsible for mitigating them are acting in the citizen's best interest. These regulations contain issues which typically deal with subjects containing substantial, unresolvable technical and scientific uncertainties. Because of this inherent uncertainty, the relationships between citizens and regulators, with elected officials in the middle, becomes an especially difficult form of agent relationship. We conclude that the problems associated with this agent relationship are unlikely to be resolved solely by administrative reform, reliance on experts, or risk education because, generally, these reforms are focused strictly on narrowing the risk uncertainty. From economic principles, however, we recognize that the value of efforts to minimize this risk uncertainty (or to maximize the technical and scientific information about risks) is subject to 'diminishing marginal utility'. Thus, these efforts ultimately can be expected to become unpopular with both citizens and elected officials. We expect, therefore, that the outcome of the risk regulation debate, and ultimately environment, health and safety policy decisions, will primarily be determined by the values of the proponents and opponents as to the relative ranking of efficiency and equity. Most likely, the best means available for reforming risk regulation and making it more coherent and to avoid some of the costly mistakes of the past is to: 1. increase the resources available for identifying risks and effective responses to them, 2. build in mechanisms for informing the public that policy decisions using these regulations are value laden, and 3. publicize both the process and the outcomes of risk regulations and policy decisions.}
place = {Sweden}
year = {1999}
month = {Dec}
}