Standing’s Expected Value

This Article argues in favor of standing based on expected value of harm. Standing doctrine has been constructed in a way that is oblivious to the idea of expected value. If people have suffered a loss with a positive expected value, they have suffered an “injury in fact.” The incorporation of expected value into standing doctrine casts doubt on many of the Supreme Court’s decisions in which it denies standing because the relevant injury is too “speculative” or is not “likely” to be redressed by a decree in the plaintiff’s favor. This Article addresses this shortcoming in standing jurisprudence by proposing a theory of expected value-based standing. It argues that the Constitution presents no obstacle to expected value-based standing, that the “injury-in-fact” test requires only a positive expected value, and that the prudential barrier to generalized grievances is the sole obstacle to expected value-based standing.