This post is subtly mistitled.
My knee-jerk answer to the exact question ("How Much Would You Need to Be Paid to Give Up Your Life Vest on Your Next Flight?") was $1,000.
However, the real question is how much extra would you pay to have a life vest on your flight (if the default were that you didn't have a life vest). There my price point might be more than $1 but is definitely less than $5. (Assume for the moment that I wasn't allowed to bring my own.)
Posted by Matt Bruce at September 2, 2008 12:05 PMMy understanding is that the value of a life jacket is basically nil since you aren't going to survive a "water landing"** anyway.
** As George Carlin noted, a water landing sounds a lot like "crashing into the ocean".
Posted by: Kubi at September 2, 2008 02:23 PMUm. Coase's Theorem merely says that an efficient outcome will be reached regardless of initial allocations. Naturally, which parties reap the benefits (or bear the costs) of reaching that efficient outcome depends on the initial allocations.
For instance, if you consider the airport noise pollution problem which is kind of the canonical illustration, whether the airports or the residents bear the costs depends completely on how the property rights are initially distributed.
Posted by: Paul at September 3, 2008 01:54 PM