Amazingly, people often fail to respond to negative incentives, because they think they will be lucky enough to avoid them. See: - heart attacks - lung disease

Amazingly, people often fail to respond to negative incentives, because they think they will be lucky enough to avoid them. See: - heart attacks - lung disease - saving for retirement - vehicle emissions - etc. And, even if you can’t afford the punishment for killing another human being, you might still be able to afford to take the risk to do so. It’s a sort of lessor version of a free-rider problem. Even there, this is assuming that people that take on this level of personal liability are even aware that they are taking that risk.