I feel like that's what was so unconvincing to me in this article. The only argument they gave against over-engineering was cost. At that point you have to decide how much risk is worth how much in savings. Is a 1% increase in the likelihood of the bridge failing in extreme conditions and killing 10 people worth a savings of $100k? What's a human life worth? What's a low increase in risk to a human's life worth? How much of an increase in the tax rate is reasonable to reduce the likelihood of someone dying due to a structure failing?
On my end, it's pretty easy. Am I personally willing to pay an extra $100 in taxes a year to measurably reduce the likelihood of another resident dying due to structure failure? If there's a quantifiable advantage to the increased cost, then absolutely. Will the increases in my taxes reduce a 4% chance of failure to 3% over 25 years? Heck yeah. Even better, how about we find some other facet of the budget that does not benefit the populace? What business is being subsidized by my taxes that does not benefit anyone who needs the help? There's lots of that here.
Trying to decide whether to cut the weight on an airplane? How much money will it save? What does that do to the price of a ticket? Is a savings of $10 per ticket worth a 1% increase in the likelihood of the plane crashing into a cornfield in the next 10 years? It sure doesn't seem worth it to me.
Honestly, those cost savings don't usually go into decreasing the price of tickets anyway. In my pessimistic view of reality, what actually ends up happening is that I pay that $10 per ticket either way and the reduced cost leading to that reduction in safety for the passengers ends up going into some executive's pocket. So even the argument that reduced costs are a good thing for the average person isn't really an argument at all. The person who might die from the decision is never going to see the benefit anyway and at that point, this starts looking like a pretty terrible deal for the average person.
Spacecraft seem like one of the few cases where a small decrease in safety factor can result in a big decrease in cost. The thing about rockets is that they have to lift their own fuel, so if you decrease the mass by 10% you can leave off not just the fuel needed to lift that part of the rocket, but also the rocket fuel needed to lift that amount of rocket fuel, and so on. Conversely, every additional pound for payload you get would otherwise have to be achieved by a much more significant increase in the size of the rocket.
On my end, it's pretty easy. Am I personally willing to pay an extra $100 in taxes a year to measurably reduce the likelihood of another resident dying due to structure failure? If there's a quantifiable advantage to the increased cost, then absolutely. Will the increases in my taxes reduce a 4% chance of failure to 3% over 25 years? Heck yeah. Even better, how about we find some other facet of the budget that does not benefit the populace? What business is being subsidized by my taxes that does not benefit anyone who needs the help? There's lots of that here.
Trying to decide whether to cut the weight on an airplane? How much money will it save? What does that do to the price of a ticket? Is a savings of $10 per ticket worth a 1% increase in the likelihood of the plane crashing into a cornfield in the next 10 years? It sure doesn't seem worth it to me.
Honestly, those cost savings don't usually go into decreasing the price of tickets anyway. In my pessimistic view of reality, what actually ends up happening is that I pay that $10 per ticket either way and the reduced cost leading to that reduction in safety for the passengers ends up going into some executive's pocket. So even the argument that reduced costs are a good thing for the average person isn't really an argument at all. The person who might die from the decision is never going to see the benefit anyway and at that point, this starts looking like a pretty terrible deal for the average person.