Research Note: Assessing Household Service Losses with Joint Survival Probabilities

Traditional analyses of household service losses in personal injury and wrongful death litigation calculate the losses over the expected lifetime of the injured or deceased individual. In fact, the losses to the surviving family members are more accurately described by using joint survival probabilities of the injured or deceased person and their survivors, or a “joint life expectancy.” The use of joint probabilities will always serve to reduce expected household service losses and these reductions can be especially significant when the deceased is significantly younger than the surviving spouse or if the survivor has a relatively low remaining life expectancy.