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It makes no sense that money police collects goes directly towards funding any government department. It should go into a tax refund pool.
by kgwxd 8y ago
It makes no sense that money police collects goes directly towards funding any government department. It should go into a tax refund pool.
- merpnderp 8y agoI was trying to think of a place to stick the money that wouldn't incentivize over-policing and couldn't think of one. But your option is perfect. There's obviously no incentive for government employees to return money to tax payers, so if anything, this would incentivize under-enforcement of fines and fees.
- antsar 8y agoAren't government employees also taxpayers? The incentive is much weaker, but still there.
- Gibbon1 8y agoI thought long and hard about that one and decided that fines should be remitted to the social security administration and booked against the perps account as a contribution. As far as I can tell this is extremely easy to implement. And utterly removes any mal-incentives.
- maym86 8y agoIt means the fine could have less of a deterrant effect on anyone who can afford it as they can frame it as money they'll get back in the long run. Why not speed if your ticket counts towards your retirement. Having a inbuilt social good for breaking the law might make people more willing to do so as they can justify their illegal action as a contribution to public good.
- zipwitch 8y agoFines also need to be proportional to income, or you're (potentially) doing far more harm than intended or neccessary to the poorest violators, and failing to deter the wealthier ones.
- Gibbon1 8y agoYou already have the problem that small fines aren't much of a deterrent effect on wealthy people. Though one might be surprised how butthurt well to do people can be over trivial amounts of money. A mitigating thing is monthly SS insurance benefits max out.
- maym86 8y agoSpeed until you max out your social security benefit is a crazy incentive.
- Gibbon1 8y agoYou can also max out the points on your license and your insurance companies patience.
- maym86 8y agoThat happens either way, the discussion is about having an effective fine to discourage people and crediting the person's social security account clearly doesn't do that.
- Gibbon1 8y agoI don't think you actually understand how the social security program works.
- maym86 8y agoJust saying someone doesn't understand something because they disagree with your idea is not a constructive argument. You pay in monthly based on income up to a maximum amount. If you say a speeding fine just counts towards my monthly contribution and is deducted from what I have to pay anyway why not speed?
- slededit 8y agoThat way if I want to contribute more than the maximum to my 401k I can use this as a workaround. And drive super fast too!
- BLKNSLVR 8y agoUse it to fund Internal Affairs...
- QuadmasterXLII 8y agoHave the defendant bring the fine in cash, and ritually burn it with witnesses present. This is equivalent to collecting the money, because it allows the government to print slightly more money without inflation, but verifiably prevents anyone directly involved from pocketing it.
- mikeash 8y agoIt makes no sense if your goal is to avoid corruption and ensure justice. That’s a really big “if.”
- mc32 8y agoTotally agree. All this should go into a central/state coffers and redustributed to policing based on need. There are rural areas greatly underserved by law enforcement due to low pop densities, so there has to be something which accounts fir that.
- briffle 8y agoIts hard for some people to believe just how low budget some rural areas are for policing. I used to live in a west coast county that was about 6,000 sq miles. It had one city with a population over 25k. (about 66,000 total in the county) At nights, there was 2 county deputies, and 2 state police officers on duty. (the city had its own force with 2 officers on duty at night) Also, their costs were pretty high, since they had so many miles to drive (more fuel/maintenance, more replacing).
- jermaustin1 8y agoThere was a small village (300-500 people) surrounded by my home town growing up. They had a part-time mayor/police officer. When he wasn't running the town, he was bringing in revenue by sitting in his car outside the courthouse waiting for a "speeder" to "blow through" his 15 mph zone and pay him the $75 ticket. Since I didn't live there, I'm not sure if calling 9-1-1 called this cop/mayor directly, or if it went to my town's dispatch.
- jmulho 8y agoThere are governments in rural areas funded by speed traps.
- grimjack00 8y agoIt'll be interesting to see what happens when autonomous cars that stick to the speed limit become the majority of traffic.
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoThe speed limits will go up to reflect reality by then so it won't matter who/what is driving the car.
- gumby 8y agoI agree, and same with punitive damage awards.
- jbob2000 8y agoIn Canada, you get a 20-25% surcharge on your fines called the "Victim Fine Surcharge". It goes directly into a fund that pays out to victims of crime. Aside from that, the fines go to the jurisdiction that charged you, which can then be used for whatever the jurisdiction wants; road repairs, school improvements, landscaping, administration, etc. etc. So if you were charged with a provincial fine, the money would go to the province, if you were charged with a regional fine, the money would go to the region. In a way, that's a "tax-refund" pool, isn't it? We don't need to spend as much tax money on these things because the fines partially fund them.
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoThe more progressive places in the US usually have a laundry list of surcharges like that they've built up over the years (the less progressive places simply haven't built up these kinds of practices over the years). A $50 5-over ticket comes with a $100 surcharge that goes to the anti-DUI education fund, $100 toward the brain injury fund, $100 toward the reckless drivers victims fund, etc etc. All these fines get directed at various nonprofits that do things like run the mandatory classes people have to to take after getting a DUI or your 3rd speeding ticket or whatever. Of course those classes cost hundreds of dollars to attend. I don't think anyone is quite sure where the money goes. Of course this is all done with good intentions but the practical effect is that it just increases the fraction of the population who's one traffic offense away from sliding into poverty. Awhile ago there was an article posted here about the breakdown of fines for a simple speeding ticket in CA and it was pretty disgusting the amount of fines that one has to pay in addition to the ticket itself and it all goes toward stuff that should probably be funded via the general budget or not at all. Maybe someone can find the article.
- xkcd-sucks 8y agoIf you take a formal ethics class, you will study conflicts of interest. This sort of thing is brought up as a toy example that's too blatant to exist in the real world... except where government is concerned, apparently
- clairity 8y agothat's a good policy change that mitigates the moral hazard of fines in general. i know it'd never happen, but i'd love to see something similar with fines from all sorts of companies, to reduce their use all over the economy as a way of hiding the true cost of products (particularly internet and phones). however, i'd challenge the idea that solving more crimes is necessarily a better use of our tax dollars. cars are the number one killer of people in america that police can directly affect. so why wouldn't we want more enforcement of traffic rules (which is where most of those fines come from), to reduce traffic fatalities? (we need to know which rules best reduce fatalities of course, but that's a given) suicides are also high on that list. community policing techniques can help there. and don't get me wrong, homicide investigations are important, for both prevention and justice, but homicides shouldn't dictate spending on, and the attention of, our police force. at the bottom of the list are mass shootings (basically a rounding error of yearly gun deaths), yet police forces spend disproportionate amounts of money on (reacting to) mass shootings (assault weapons, active shooter gear, tanks, etc.).
- hfdgiutdryg 8y agocars are the number one killer of people in america that police can directly affect. so why wouldn't we want more enforcement of traffic rules I think automotive industry innovation can do more to bring the fatalities down than any practical amount of policing. Also, I'm tired of the low standards for actual driving ability in America, combined with the lazy speed enforcement approach by cops. My life has very, very rarely been threatened by a speeder, but it has regularly been threatened (particularly when I'm cycling or walking) by negligent or outright incompetent drivers.
- clairity 8y agothe automotive industry has done a good job improving auto safety already, and i'm sure will continue to work on it, but i imagine the improvements are marginal at this point. auto makers would have to rip out all screens and install sensors to detect eating, drinking, phone use, newspaper reading, makeup application, etc. to make a large dent in the problem. but i'm with you about distracted and incompetent driving. let's better enforce unsafe driving laws, like blowing through stop signs or careening across 4 lanes to exit the freeway at the last minute (both of which i see all the time). and let's incorporate simulators in driving tests that put people in a variety of potential accident scenarios that they must successfully maneuver. or something even better. but something real, not this safety theater we have now.
- Gustomaximus 8y agoIt should be the same for govt asset sales. It should go into some common pool and have delayed release so you dont get politicians financing their budget via community owned assets.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]