This was sort of my dissertation in law school (their equivalent at least, which is to say it was not as rigorous as a real dissertation). I think it remains relevant and useful (though not immune from criticism). I'm not going to just cut and paste the whole thing, just some useful bits.

In summary: The richer a person is, the safer they are. When the Government issues regulations to industries, complying with those regulations saves a certain number of lives (assuming it is a health, environmental, or safety regulation), and it also costs money. The money used to comply ultimately comes from the pockets of people. Sometimes, the cost to comply results in enough of a decrease in wealth for people that more people end up dying as a result of the cost of complying than the number of people that are saved as a result of the regulation.

This theory started with a 1991 OSHA case, where a judge argued

"Second, even where the application of cost-benefit analysis would result in less stringent regulation, the reduced stringency is not necessarily adverse to health or safety. More regulation means some combination of reduced value of firms, higher product prices, fewer jobs in the regulated industry and lower cash wages. All the later three stretch workers' budgets tighter (as does the first to the extent that firms' stock is held in workers' pension trusts). And larger incomes enable people to lead safer lives...Larger incomes can produce health by enlarging a person's access to better diet, preventive medical care, safer cars, greater leisure, etc..."

Citing two studies this judge estimated that each $7.5 million in costs of regulation would cause one fatality.

After that, the OMB decided to try and block a clean air regulation because OSHA estimated the regulations would cost $163 million and would save 8 to 13 lives, but the OMB proclaimed that the regulations would actually cost 22 lives, for a net loss of 9 to 14 lives. Ultimately, the issue was tabled by OSHA and the OMB pending further research into this issue (which I got from them via a Freedom of Information Act request). With a change in administrations, nobody ever really got back to this analysis.

Aaron Wildavsky, author of Searching for Safety, offers four basic impacts from safety regulations:

1) loss of opportunity benefits that might have been provided by the substance or practice banned; 2) The safety measures themselves may directly cause harm through their own designated mechanisms (this happened with the initial Asbestos laws, when they found that the act of removing it from all buildings caused more deaths than leaving it in some buildings); 3) indirect reductions in health due to decreases in family income; 4) reduction in the wealth of society in general, diminishing its resilience.

After analyzing ten different scientific studies on the issue, I concluded the average cost to save one life is about $5.12 million, give or take a bit. If anyone is interested in study details, I'd be happy to provide them.

The connection between increased costs to a company being passed on to individuals is also pretty well researched. The company absorbs some of the costs (and that is accounted for in the studies researched, and in that $5.12M figure), but a great deal of the cost of regulations is passed on to non-executives. If the company has less, they have less money for wages, hire fewer people, invest less in things that make non-executives money, make less money which impacts employee pensions and 401-Ks, increase consumer prices which filters down to pretty much everyone, etc..

The reasons why Richer is Safer are varied. A small sample of the potential harms caused by lower income:

Less discretionary safety measures, such as fire alarms; less stress reduction from not being able to hire babysitters, household help, or go on vacation; unemployment causing increased suicide, heart attacks, alcoholism, crime, and child abuse; less prenatal health care; the foregoing of physical exams and preventative medical expenses (e.g. pap smears); lower attendance of addiction clinics to stop things like smoking; less likely to complete high school or college; residency in worse neighborhoods; less time for family relationships and social contacts; worse education; less association with individuals who care more about health and safety; worse sanitary procedures; fewer "child-proofed" homes to reduce accidents; not buying better tires; eating less healthful food; working more hours; etc..

In other words, the cost of regulations impact people's "life sustaining choices."

So, if you want to regulate something so that you save lives, if the cost of the regulation exceeds $5.12M per life saved, you're probably actually killing more people than you are saving.