An armchair economist's view on why Katrina's victims should not receive government assistance

Using a fable of two cities, Steven Landsburg, author of Fair Play: What Your Child Can Teach You About Economics, Values, and the Meaning of Life and The Armchair Economist, offers two reasons why there should be a rethink on giving federal assistance to Katrina and similar natural disaster victims.

Reason number one: "It encourages people to live in dangerous places."

Reason number two: "It denies people the opportunity to accept higher risks in exchange for lower housing costs.

The analysis is surely logical, but the lack of compassion in the thinking process, I believe, is difficult for many readers to stomach. And it is analysis like this that gives a bad name to economists (as if it is not bad enough already).

He concludes the article by saying that "those abstract principles might be partly offset by any number of real world considerations. But if we want to build a better world, no truth should be ignored." What "better" world do you have in mind, and what "truth" can you claim to have discovered, Mr. Armchair Economist?

----------
What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them.
----------