An Analysis of the de minimis Strategy for Risk Management

A de minimis risk management strategy sets a threshold so that risks below the specified level are defined as trivial and exempted from further consideration. The intended purpose is to help avoid inappropriate and wasteful concern with insignificant low-level risks. In most instances a de minimis strategy is likely to have beneficial or innocuous effects, but under certain circumstances large differences may develop between nominal and actual de minimis levels. The potential for such discrepancies illustrates why de minimis (and all other risk management) strategies should be evaluated on the basis of the portfolio of risks that would accumulate from applying such strategies over time, rather than on the apparent reasonableness of any single instance of application.