Iran Mortality and Measures of Risk: Rankings for Public policy

Abstract

"nBackground: This paper offers mortality risk rankings for Iranian mortality data. It extends methods to include mixed co­horts, tests changes in mortality risks, compares measures of risk and discusses public policy implications."nMethods: The methodology used in risk measures takes current practice and extends it to include variations in population dy­nam­ics. The specification is presented and compared with existing literature."nResults: Our findings confirm literature results in the re-ordering that takes place when different risk measures are used. In ad­di­tion, we find there is consistency in risk rankings between 1999 and 2000 records of Iranian mortality data.  Thus, these risk measures are stable, robust across time and relay risk information consistently."nConclusions: There are considerable implications in adopting particular risk measures for public policy. However, given prop­er­ties of risk measures discussed here, it is clear that policy makers can select relevant risk measures depending on their pri­ori­ties.

Keywords

• Mortality risk
• Value of life
• Life lost expectancy
• Risk ranking
• Iran