Human Life Values

What is the value of a human life?

This question has been asked throughout history, and I am sure there is no accurate answer. A human plays many roles in their life, for example

Husband, Wife, Partner, Lover, Father, Mother, Brother, Sister, Son, Daughter, Aunty, Grandfather, Uncle, Grandmother, Income Producer, Service Provider, Confidant, Friend, Teammate, Coach, Handyperson, And many More . . .

Trying to place a value on each of these rolls is almost impossible. How can you put a dollar value on father teaching a son to ride a bike or a value on a mother tending to a sick child in the middle of the night? The answer is that you can't. It is as simple as that. You can however place a value on a person's capacity as an income producer/provider or as a service provider.

The principles of Human Life Values, within our expertise, deal with the financial impact upon the family resulting from the loss of a income producer or a service provider due to death or disablement. The financial struggle that the surviving family may undergo can be traumatic and this event could severely disadvantage the opportunities of the family unit in the future. When a family suffers a major loss of income on a long term or permanent basis, chances are that the children of these families could be less likely to have the opportunity to academically achieve due to rising educational costs.

Until recently, the welfare state provided a useful backstop via social welfare. However today, families cannot rely on receiving adequate financial support from the government in the event of the death or disablement of a breadwinner.

The policy of Work and Income New Zealand is that it will provide enough money to pay for housing, food and power. This Government Dept maintains that it is a matter of choice, if you have a telephone, your choice if you take your child to a doctor, your choice if you allow your child to play sport or take part in a school trip. The Dept maintains that these additional family expenditure requirements are a matter of "expenditure choice" and will not provide extra money for them.

Our work specialises in providing valuations on these Human Life Values, once we have identified a persons "value" we are then able to predict the loss a family would suffer if that person was disabled or dies prematurely.

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