Is safety expensive? No it isn't.

Mark McIlroy

13.12.2025



Nothing can put a price on human life. However, there are some that say that measures to improve safety should be limited because they are expensive.

I'll address this with four points.


1. In 2017 there were a million commercial jet aircraft flights and not a single person died. This is an achievement in safety that many would think impossible.

Was this expensive?

I'll answer by saying that a person can get a flight from Melbourne to Manila, which is a 9 hour flight covering 6,800km, usually with a stop-over in Singapore or Hong Kong, for $290.

Working at the minimum wage this is about two day's work.

As most people would only take a flight like this once a year, I personally think that this is very good value and not expensive.


2. If something is very safe, a large number of people will do it which lowers costs and actually makes it cheaper.


3. Doing something more professionally, at a higher level, has costs but can also make the finished product cheaper as well.


4. Final point, accidents are horrifically expensive. Ignoring injuries or loss of life for a moment, the cost of having an accident includes - lost production time, compensation for victims, legal costs in defending lawsuits, repair of equipment, costs for investigators, regulatory fines, reputation damage leading to fewer sales in future, higher insurance premiums, difficulty raising funding in the future.