Are the state’s obligations to victims of its own wrongdoing greater than to persons who have suffered from bad luck? Many people endorse an affirmative answer to this question. Call this the Difference View. This view can seem arbitrary from the perspective of the victims in question; why should a victim of bad luck, who is just as badly off through no fault of her own, be entitled to less assistance from the state than a victim of state-caused wrongful harm? This paper defends a qualified version of the Difference View, the Threshold Version of the Difference View. According to this view, all disadvantaged persons, no matter what the cause of their disadvantage, must be compensated until they reach a minimum threshold of wellbeing; however, among disadvantaged persons above this threshold, full compensation is owed for those who are victims of state wrongdoing, whereas full compensation is not necessarily owed to those who are disadvantaged due to bad luck.

国家对自身不法行为的受害者的义务是否比对倒霉的人的义务更大？许多人赞同对这个问题的肯定回答。称之为差异视图。从有关受害者的角度来看，这种观点似乎是武断的；为什么一个倒霉的受害者，她不是因为自己的过错而过得很糟糕，比国家造成的不法伤害的受害者有权获得国家的援助更少？本文为差异视图的合格版本辩护，差异视图的阈值版本. 根据这种观点，所有处于不利地位的人，无论其不利地位的原因是什么，都必须得到补偿，直到他们达到最低限度的幸福感；但是，在超过这一门槛的弱势群体中，国家不法行为的受害者应获得全额赔偿，而因运气不佳而处于不利地位的人不一定要获得全额赔偿。