Easy-to-process things feel truer, safer, and more appealing.
More quotesThe spike in the steering wheel is grotesque because it makes the driver’s exposure impossible to forget. Tullock’s thought experiment removes protection until caution becomes intensely personal.
It is also catnip for clever people who want to sound harder-headed than the safety measure. Mention risk compensation and somebody will suggest that helmets, seat belts or forgiving systems merely encourage recklessness. The interesting second-order effect becomes an excuse to ignore the first-order injury. That is economic sophistication performed with somebody else’s skull.
People may adjust behaviour after protection changes. Some drive faster, participate more often or attempt harder tasks. Others change nothing. The net effect depends on how much behaviour moves and how much harm the protection prevents. People rarely offset every gain, effects vary by setting, and the final measure is harm—hardly whether road users remained sufficiently afraid of driving fast.
The imaginary spike therefore stays imaginary. Seat belts remain attached. The ledger contains injuries, exposure, speed, near misses and who entered the activity after it became safer. Compensation is part of the result, neither a magic objection nor a reason to stop counting.
One driver buckles up and continues at the same speed. Another presses slightly harder. The belt does its physical job in both cars. The final injury figures arrive much later.