It is pretty simple if you watch or read Dan Ariely: http://danariely.com/2011/10/06/upside-of-irrationality-chapter-9/ http://danariely.com/2011/10/06/upside-

It is pretty simple if you watch or read Dan Ariely: http://danariely.com/2011/10/06/upside-of-irrationality-chapter-9/ http://danariely.com/2011/10/06/upside-of-irrationality-chap... It is a known problem in behavioral economics called the identifiable victim effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identifiable_victim_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identifiable_victim_effect Basically "Vivid, flesh and blood-victims are often more powerful sources of persuasion than abstract statistic". Most people love Lions and think they are awesome, and hate seeing them caged in zoos. Now we hear about this one lion minding it's own business being lured from a preserve and being killed by some rich American guy .... the lion becomes the flesh and blood victim. Problem like hyperinflation and massive death, while obviously much worse (and horrible) are much harder for the human mind to understand and just become a statistic. It is extremely scary that this is a problem but it is fairly well known and studied. Stalin even knew about the problem: "one man's death is a tragedy, a millions deaths are a statistic" I obviously agree with you, just pointing you to why it is happening.