Frequently, scientists or economists attempt of place a monetary value on human life.

Recently, a group of researchers at Stanford University computed the value of a healthy year of life to be $129,000.  This number represented the threshold beyond which ensuring another quality year of life was no longer financially cost effective.  In other words, if the cost of healthcare for any year of your life exceeded this number, then any further expense would not be justified.

So just how should we place a value on a human life?  Well, life cannot be valued by how much it costs to provide healthcare.   We are certainly of greater value than the few dollars worth of minerals and chemicals that comprise our bodies.  How do you value a dream, or unrealized human potential, or a tear falling to the ground?   What is the value of hope?

When it's all said and done, life is just too valuable to place a price-tag upon.  Yet every day we witness the wholesale devaluing of life.  When children are abused by brutality, when men take a life in a wanton act of crime or violence, when wars of oppression are perpetrated on helpless masses, we are all diminished, devalued and made smaller.  When dictators rob their nations of their right to democratic self-determination, we witness an impoverishing of the human spirit.

But do we question our own self-worth if we willingly collaborate in our devaluation.  To question your value, your dignity, or your right to exist; to live beneath your potential, to abandon your dreams is to cheapen your life.  And when you assassinate your own value, you rob the world of your unique contribution.

When we look at our society, we unfortunately see far too many people willingly or involuntarily devalued.  Yet, until each of us learns to value and respect each other, we will always be less than we should be.