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William_Quixote comments on A Cost- Benefit Analysis of Immunizing Healthy Adults Against Influenza - Less Wrong
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I think the calculation somewhat under values the cost of being sick. If it's been a while since the last turn you were serriously sick it's easy to forget just how deeply unpleasant it is. I was really sick with food poisoning recently and would have happily paid >500 USD to avoid that. It's been a while since I had the flu, but I think putting the misery and suffering at less than 300 USD is not optimal modeling.
I would agree that 200 USD is a low estimate for the cost of the experience of being sick. The reason I chose that figure was because I was trying to show that getting flu shots was still an activity with positive expected value for healthy adults, even given uncharitable assumptions. If you value not getting sick with the flu as being worth more than 200 USD, then the expected value that you would derive from receiving yearly flu vaccinations would be even higher than the figure cited in the report.
Also, note that the reason I did the calculation for healthy adults, rather than for, say, an average person living in a first-world country, is because healthy adults don't benefit quite as much from getting the vaccine as other demographics do. So, if getting a flu shot is preferable to not getting a flu shot for healthy adults, then getting a flu shot is even more preferable to not getting a flu shot for other demographics.