This neoliberal is delighted to argue this question

Is he literally complaining that the USCG didn’t spend resources to rescue some migrants off the coast of Greece? Is he complaining that the Greeks don’t hold all humans as worth saving as the USCG does?

Because this all seems to be a Greek problem.

Surely the lesson of both incidents is that if you voluntarily, of your own free will, and at enormous cost, put to sea in an vessel that is so unsafe you expose yourself to a high risk of death, then the consequences are basically your problem?

Jesus on a bicycle – you can’t just *assume* all lives are of equal worth.
Compared to when? to modify the Tom Sowell question.
Those Pak lives are worth significantly more than Pak lives were in 1948.

You can desire that they are of equal worth, so go out and promote strategies like free trade, globalisation, FDI which have brought those worths both higher and closer together. Definitely do not promote progressive protectionism. Twat.

I must admit I value my life far more than that of others. Of course I’m sure they consider theirs to be worth far more than mine.

This is why I always thought Raygun Ron’s missile defence system made a lot of sense. Quite clearly, it was much better to spend a billion dollars to save my worthless hide than to waste it on incinerating a billion foreigners.

More perhaps to the point, the Pakis were breaking the law of Greece, and indeed the EU, and potentially that of Britain. Should you lavish everything you have on people who choose to risk their lives to break your laws.

This is the usual attitude of the left. Because we’re all human, we must all give their favoured pets whatever they want. And it’s evil racism to expect to get anything we want, or indeed anything at all, from them.

Murph’s argument is basically that of imperialism. The wogs are worth the same as us, so we must sacrifice everything we have to make sure they’re just like us.

But since I grew up during the period of imperial collapse, I naturally believe that the wogs should be free to go to hell however they choose. We have solved a large number of the problems they suffer from. The methods of dealing with them are in the public domain. So they can copy us if they wish. If they don’t it’s their problem.

This very definitely applies to the Pakis and other Third Worlders. Places like China, and now India, are industrialising fast. I suspect that we’ll deindustrialise and be whinging and whining for scraps from them pretty soon.

However as matters are now, we can spend our resources on whoever we please. If the Pakis come grovelling to the UK and beg to be kept in order by the noose and the lash as they were in the good old days, you can do what you wish. I’d just give ’em the finger.

One wreck may yield insights into the behaviour of titanium / carbon fibre composites and perspex under extreme pressure, thereby leading to technical advances.
The other is just an overloaded boat.

3: What gives Lord Spud the right to direct the allocation of resources above those people who wish to use those resources?

Yes, Longrider’s site is down for me too.

There is an established literature on whether or not policy should consider all lives to be of equal worth. For starters, he could look at agent-relative ethics. I love my kids more than I love your kids (sorry) and therefore vote in a way that reflects this preference. Second, if all lives are equal, including lives in the future, then this generation has to shoulder the burden of all future generations equally to our own. We then get into a paradox where it appears optimal to bear huge expense in this generation so that all future generations can benefit by tiny amounts even though (according to the vast majority of economic forecasts) future generations are expected to be significantly wealthier than our own. The idea that this is a question that no neo-liberal wants to answer is flat wrong.

Mr Elliott, I have to say I’m somewhat relieved to read a comment from you. Post Titan, I had visions of a small pile of wreckage somewhere on the Isle of Man, thinking that another example of adolescent wish fulfillment had had dire consequences…

bis,

It’s a scam. Both tour operators only sell one way tickets.

Single man, lives in house with FOUR Bedrooms and THREE public rooms, complains about the inequality in allocation of resources.

A more blatant example of over-consumption it would be hard to find. Time to reintroduce a window tax, with penal rates for under-occupation.

What an insufferable cvnt he is, truly.

@Bit4thR
Of course it’s a scam. It’s Spanish advertising.

“Suppose we just assumed all lives were of equal worth.”

To whom?

I’ll chime in from the Left. As you often note, many important things are not captured in economic analyses. Most of those important things would not support your argument, but let’s stay with the economics.

And from the economic POV I think you’re broadly correct. Good for you, Tim! And I’m very pleased you share my hope for a future where even in economic terms we are all roughly equal. It’s good to have a goal.

But I would submit that what will define us ethically in the eyes of future generations is what we do in this period of time when inequality is so great. See? Ethics and Economics… at least they start with the same letter…

@ Jack C
It’s described as a “Greek shipwreck” in order to blame a centre-right government, whose fault it was not, rather than the greedy, brutal, “third-world” criminals who callously (and in this instance, fatally) risked other people’s lives for their own profits because Guardian Newspapers Ltd (including “The Observer”) has an editorial policy that all the evil in the world is caused by middle-aged middle-class white males.

There is no greater service we can render the oppressed of the earth than to maintain inviolate the freedom of our own citizens.
Liberty is not collective, it is personal. All liberty is individual liberty.
There is no substitute for a militant freedom. The only alternative is submission and slavery.
Freedom is not only bought with a great price; it is maintained by unremitting effort.
There is no justification for public interference with purely private concerns.
The individual has rights…And the protection of rights is righteous.
Ultimately, property rights and personal rights are the same thing.
When once the right of the individual to liberty and equality is admitted, there is no escape from the conclusion that he alone is entitled to the rewards of his own industry. Any other conclusion would necessarily imply either privilege or servitude.

Calvin Coolidge. “Silent Cal” nails it.

But I would submit that what will define us ethically in the eyes of future generations is what we do in this period of time when inequality is so great.

You seem to be defining inequality as undesirable.
Care to show your working?
If a person succeeds & receives the benefits of their success, inequality increases. As it should do. Take that away & where’s the incentive for doing anything.

And a little cod philosophy. Before we’re asked about how we judge other’s value, it’s worth asking how we adjudge our own value to ourselves? I would submit by the degree we raise our own living standards. That’s what civilisation’s all about, isn’t it? And in commerce, we combine to do this. This doesn’t come free. It takes effort. So of course we value ourselves higher than a bunch of Pakis. As they value themselves lower. Both individually & culturally. If they valued themselves as high as we do us, they’d raise their own living standards. But they don’t. They seek to come to where we live to get a free ride on our efforts.

But I would submit that what will define us ethically is what we do. Full stop.
Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn how much money Elon or Warren or Jeff has got – what defines *me* ethically *includes* (BUT IS NOT LIMITED TO) what I do with *my* money, not what anyone outside my direct sphere of influence does.
My personal view is that I wish to help the deserving poor but that I have no right to impose personal views upon other people (unless I see a thug attack an innocent person).