Deontological (rule-based) ethics are often implicitly justified by the good outcomes their rules are presumed to create. If a moral rule was known to produce the worst possible results, its proponents would likely abandon it, revealing a hidden consequentialist foundation for their beliefs.
Despite living with unprecedented wealth, many in the West feel a 'cost of living crisis.' This is because human happiness is dictated by a narrow frame of reference—we compare ourselves to our immediate peers, not to the global population or to past generations. Our sense of well-being is relative, not absolute.
Even if one rejects hedonism—the idea that happiness is the only thing that matters—any viable ethical framework must still consider happiness and suffering as central. To argue otherwise is to claim that human misery is morally irrelevant in and of itself, a deeply peculiar and counter-intuitive position.
Common thought experiments attacking consequentialism (e.g., a doctor sacrificing one patient for five) are flawed because they ignore the full scope of consequences. A true consequentialist analysis would account for the disastrous societal impacts, such as the erosion of trust in medicine, which would make the act clearly wrong.
A truly happy life doesn't mean avoiding all pain. Certain forms of stress and suffering, like difficult exercise, are integral to achieving deeper well-being. By providing contrast and building resilience, these negative experiences can increase one's total happiness over the long term.
The subjective experience of suffering can be worse for those who are poor amidst extreme wealth (e.g., homeless in San Francisco) than for those in an environment of shared, absolute poverty. The constant, stark comparison of one's own failure against others' success can create a mental anguish that outweighs objective material hardship.