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> “...I would love it if reckless drivers would lose their license at the first offense.” that’s too punitive, but i’d be quite happy with a quickly escalating

> “...I would love it if reckless drivers would lose their license at the first offense.” that’s too punitive, but i’d be quite happy with a quickly escalating, income-/wealth-adjusted fine. so like 0.01% of yearly income on first offense, 0.1% on second offense, 1% on third offense, or something like that, on a rolling 12-month basis, where you can voluntarily give up you license for 3 months to reset the scale of you can’t/don’t want to pay. driving without a license could reinstate the scale and invoke the next level of fine on top.

caslon 6y ago
How is it too punitive? They're operating a massive structure of (usually literally) flaming steel. If they can't consider the safety of people who very plausibly will be their victims without constant vigilance, they really shouldn't be driving. Doubly so for pickups, which are now so large that they offer a near-nonexistent risk on the driver's end for poor driving and nearly-certain serious-injury-and-or-death for anyone caught up against it.
- clairity 6y ago
  i agree that it’s the sole job of a driver to maneuver their 2-ton vehicle safely and without distraction (especially not phone distraction), but it does no good to be blindered by retributive rage when considering a counterbalancing incentive structure. we are fallible humans in a highly dynamic world, so let’s have some empathy and compassion for every mistake-making human, not just arbitrarily small groupings of them.
  - caslon 6y ago
    It's not retributive to not allow someone who has failed the most important task in driving to drive. We don't allow children to do it, we don't allow the (extremely) elderly to do it, we shouldn't allow people who put others at risk to do it either. Empathy and compassion are all fine and good, and in this case, the compassionate would make sure to take anyone who has shown willingness to cause an accident off the road for good. Not even a terrible person deserves to have a murder on their conscience, and nobody deserves to die because someone wasn't paying enough attention while flying down the highway.
- etripe 6y ago
  In my mind, because "offence", depending on legislature, might be vehicular manslaughter, a parking ticket or anything in between. There is also a huge difference between driving 55 in a 50 zone and driving 90 at the same location.
  - yokaze 6y ago
    I think the critical part here is "reckless driver", so the "offence" needs to be of a kind to qualify the driver as such. Parking ticket likely doesn't.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  >How is it too punitive? Because huge numbers of people need to drive to be productive members of society and anyone without their head in the sand knows that "normal traffic flow" is routinely in violation of the letter of the law, often to the point of being criminal (usually at the officer's discretion). That brings us to selective enforcement. And we all know who gets the shaft when everyone is breaking the law and we have to choose who it gets enforced against.
  - DoreenMichele 6y ago
    Because huge numbers of people need to drive to be productive members of society In the Netherlands? I find that claim suspect. Though I would get behind cracking down on dangerous drivers endangering pedestrians and cyclists even in the US where it's much harder to live without a car. Maybe it would get easier to live without a car if we began skewing policies in that direction.
  - xtiansimon 6y ago
    > “ "normal traffic flow" ...when everyone is breaking the law...” ?? I understood the OP as referring to vehicles sharing the roadway with bicyclists and apparently in a school zone. I have no sympathy for anyone’s excuse—worker or working moms who drive on roads shared with pedestrians and bicyclists. I live in the US, and our car-centric culture is toxic to anyone not in a car.
  - jgwil2 6y ago
    OP didn't say any traffic violation should result in revocation of license, just reckless driving. At least where I live, that's a specific violation that is well beyond any violation that might come from following normal traffic flow.
    - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
      Reckless driving as defined by statute typically includes a "more than X over the limit" clause where X is small enough to include "normal traffic speed for a clear day with light traffic on the interstate highway system and many state highways" This is exactly my point. The laws are far too broad to have stiff penalties and draconian enforcement. Of course nobody should be driving 40+ through some downtown center signed at 25 where pedestrians are present. But people routinely make common sense exemptions to the letter of the law. They treat that stop that could have been a yield were it not for the option to turn left as a yield. They ignore a 40-20-40 speed limit drop when that drop is there for a particular problem condition that is not applicable at the time. Etc. Etc. Cyclists and pedestrians make common sense exemptions all the time too, albeit a different set of exemptions specific to their mode of transportation. The overwhelming majority of traffic participants behave reasonably, but reasonable is not consistent with the letter of the law. Of course we don't want "reckless drivers" on the roads but "reckless" is by its very definition an ambiguous term and nobody's yet to nail it down in statutory form in a way that doesn't leave gaping loopholes or make reasonably people subjet to being screwed at the discretion of law enforcement. And we see that every time law enforcement tries to go hard on a particular type of crime it just devolves into doing the most enforcement against the most vulnerable.
Moru 6y ago
Too punitive? So death sentence is OK for a kid that forgets to put out the arm once? I don't really understand this mentality.
- DocTomoe 6y ago
  Again, hyperbole helps no-one. Mistakes may sometimes lead to extreme consequences. A cyclist not indicating and thus experiencing an accident is not much different from someone ignoring safety rules around power tools and getting (badly) hurt by it. The damage is accidental, not punitive. "Death sentence" in such cases is overly emotional and meant to derail a discussion. It's meant to divide, not unite. Instead of having such almost pornographic fantasies about crimes and punishments, let's rather invest some energy to determine how we can lower the number of accidents, e.g. by providing better street law education for children who are about to start cycling, and better traffic enforcement.
  - Moru 6y ago
    This is the drivers point of view, nowhere do we get the information of what actually happened. Just that the driver said the kids didn't put out the hand when he came in his big car in high speed. Were the kids actually turning or just going straight? Were they crossing the street?
    - DocTomoe 6y ago
      In all fairness, OP's description of the incident is not very clear. As both a driver and a cyclist, the only situation I can imagine a car driving through a "cloud of cyclists" under any circumstance is an intersection with a second lane for turning left (or right, in left-hand traffic countries). In such a situation, a cyclist may want to switch lanes to the turning lane, and - of course - would have to indicate the lane change. If no such indication is given, as a car driver, I would expect the cyclist to continue onwards, especially if there are lights that are green. I would not expect the cyclist to swerve out without indication - and as a cyclist, I agree that this is a very dangerous situation for the cyclist, since not only you are swerving out into the direct path of a car, but you also get slower relative to it.
gorgoiler 6y ago
In societies with professional money managing services, how do you fine someone who has no personal income, no wealth, and is in millions of dollars in debt*? *...to an offshore shell company over which they have 100% control.
- clairity 6y ago
  you make that the state revenue service’s problem, since they already face that issue anyway. any income stream, including passive income and unrealized gains, is fair game.
- MrRiddle 6y ago
  Percent of the car they were driving.
- novok 6y ago
  You remove their license and impound cars they have permission to drive
sneak 6y ago
Would revoking someone's right to own firearms the first time they acted recklessly in a crowd of children with one also seem "too punitive" to you, or should they retain their weapons to act recklessly with them in crowds a second time? The victims will be just as dead. Cars are lethal.
- clairity 6y ago
  oh yes, let’s think of the children! bubble-wrap them, lock them at home for doubleplus good, and tote around a robotic, screen-mediated facsimile so there’s no chance of pain or injury. that should fix that problem right up.
  - jgwil2 6y ago
    No one said that at all. Quite the opposite actually: the suggestion was to prevent those who would endanger children from doing so, so that the children might carry on with their lives without fear.
markvdb 6y ago
Impounding the driving license and/or car for a limited period of time could be a more egalitarian, privacy friendly and easier to implement alternative. Your idea of some form of progressive rate punishment sounds really good. Time is probably the easiest to implement parameter: - impound_car(time) - impound_license(time) - impound_license_and_car(time) - impound_license_and_all_cars_owned(time)

caslon 6y ago

How is it too punitive? They're operating a massive structure of (usually literally) flaming steel. If they can't consider the safety of people who very plausibly will be their victims without constant vigilance, they really shouldn't be driving. Doubly so for pickups, which are now so large that they offer a near-nonexistent risk on the driver's end for poor driving and nearly-certain serious-injury-and-or-death for anyone caught up against it.

clairity 6y ago
i agree that it’s the sole job of a driver to maneuver their 2-ton vehicle safely and without distraction (especially not phone distraction), but it does no good to be blindered by retributive rage when considering a counterbalancing incentive structure. we are fallible humans in a highly dynamic world, so let’s have some empathy and compassion for every mistake-making human, not just arbitrarily small groupings of them.
- caslon 6y ago
  It's not retributive to not allow someone who has failed the most important task in driving to drive. We don't allow children to do it, we don't allow the (extremely) elderly to do it, we shouldn't allow people who put others at risk to do it either. Empathy and compassion are all fine and good, and in this case, the compassionate would make sure to take anyone who has shown willingness to cause an accident off the road for good. Not even a terrible person deserves to have a murder on their conscience, and nobody deserves to die because someone wasn't paying enough attention while flying down the highway.
etripe 6y ago
In my mind, because "offence", depending on legislature, might be vehicular manslaughter, a parking ticket or anything in between. There is also a huge difference between driving 55 in a 50 zone and driving 90 at the same location.
- yokaze 6y ago
  I think the critical part here is "reckless driver", so the "offence" needs to be of a kind to qualify the driver as such. Parking ticket likely doesn't.
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
>How is it too punitive? Because huge numbers of people need to drive to be productive members of society and anyone without their head in the sand knows that "normal traffic flow" is routinely in violation of the letter of the law, often to the point of being criminal (usually at the officer's discretion). That brings us to selective enforcement. And we all know who gets the shaft when everyone is breaking the law and we have to choose who it gets enforced against.
- DoreenMichele 6y ago
  Because huge numbers of people need to drive to be productive members of society In the Netherlands? I find that claim suspect. Though I would get behind cracking down on dangerous drivers endangering pedestrians and cyclists even in the US where it's much harder to live without a car. Maybe it would get easier to live without a car if we began skewing policies in that direction.
- xtiansimon 6y ago
  > “ "normal traffic flow" ...when everyone is breaking the law...” ?? I understood the OP as referring to vehicles sharing the roadway with bicyclists and apparently in a school zone. I have no sympathy for anyone’s excuse—worker or working moms who drive on roads shared with pedestrians and bicyclists. I live in the US, and our car-centric culture is toxic to anyone not in a car.
- jgwil2 6y ago
  OP didn't say any traffic violation should result in revocation of license, just reckless driving. At least where I live, that's a specific violation that is well beyond any violation that might come from following normal traffic flow.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    Reckless driving as defined by statute typically includes a "more than X over the limit" clause where X is small enough to include "normal traffic speed for a clear day with light traffic on the interstate highway system and many state highways" This is exactly my point. The laws are far too broad to have stiff penalties and draconian enforcement. Of course nobody should be driving 40+ through some downtown center signed at 25 where pedestrians are present. But people routinely make common sense exemptions to the letter of the law. They treat that stop that could have been a yield were it not for the option to turn left as a yield. They ignore a 40-20-40 speed limit drop when that drop is there for a particular problem condition that is not applicable at the time. Etc. Etc. Cyclists and pedestrians make common sense exemptions all the time too, albeit a different set of exemptions specific to their mode of transportation. The overwhelming majority of traffic participants behave reasonably, but reasonable is not consistent with the letter of the law. Of course we don't want "reckless drivers" on the roads but "reckless" is by its very definition an ambiguous term and nobody's yet to nail it down in statutory form in a way that doesn't leave gaping loopholes or make reasonably people subjet to being screwed at the discretion of law enforcement. And we see that every time law enforcement tries to go hard on a particular type of crime it just devolves into doing the most enforcement against the most vulnerable.

Moru 6y ago

Too punitive? So death sentence is OK for a kid that forgets to put out the arm once? I don't really understand this mentality.

DocTomoe 6y ago
Again, hyperbole helps no-one. Mistakes may sometimes lead to extreme consequences. A cyclist not indicating and thus experiencing an accident is not much different from someone ignoring safety rules around power tools and getting (badly) hurt by it. The damage is accidental, not punitive. "Death sentence" in such cases is overly emotional and meant to derail a discussion. It's meant to divide, not unite. Instead of having such almost pornographic fantasies about crimes and punishments, let's rather invest some energy to determine how we can lower the number of accidents, e.g. by providing better street law education for children who are about to start cycling, and better traffic enforcement.
- Moru 6y ago
  This is the drivers point of view, nowhere do we get the information of what actually happened. Just that the driver said the kids didn't put out the hand when he came in his big car in high speed. Were the kids actually turning or just going straight? Were they crossing the street?
  - DocTomoe 6y ago
    In all fairness, OP's description of the incident is not very clear. As both a driver and a cyclist, the only situation I can imagine a car driving through a "cloud of cyclists" under any circumstance is an intersection with a second lane for turning left (or right, in left-hand traffic countries). In such a situation, a cyclist may want to switch lanes to the turning lane, and - of course - would have to indicate the lane change. If no such indication is given, as a car driver, I would expect the cyclist to continue onwards, especially if there are lights that are green. I would not expect the cyclist to swerve out without indication - and as a cyclist, I agree that this is a very dangerous situation for the cyclist, since not only you are swerving out into the direct path of a car, but you also get slower relative to it.

gorgoiler 6y ago

In societies with professional money managing services, how do you fine someone who has no personal income, no wealth, and is in millions of dollars in debt*? *...to an offshore shell company over which they have 100% control.

clairity 6y ago
you make that the state revenue service’s problem, since they already face that issue anyway. any income stream, including passive income and unrealized gains, is fair game.
MrRiddle 6y ago
Percent of the car they were driving.
novok 6y ago
You remove their license and impound cars they have permission to drive

sneak 6y ago

Would revoking someone's right to own firearms the first time they acted recklessly in a crowd of children with one also seem "too punitive" to you, or should they retain their weapons to act recklessly with them in crowds a second time? The victims will be just as dead. Cars are lethal.

clairity 6y ago
oh yes, let’s think of the children! bubble-wrap them, lock them at home for doubleplus good, and tote around a robotic, screen-mediated facsimile so there’s no chance of pain or injury. that should fix that problem right up.
- jgwil2 6y ago
  No one said that at all. Quite the opposite actually: the suggestion was to prevent those who would endanger children from doing so, so that the children might carry on with their lives without fear.

markvdb 6y ago

Impounding the driving license and/or car for a limited period of time could be a more egalitarian, privacy friendly and easier to implement alternative. Your idea of some form of progressive rate punishment sounds really good. Time is probably the easiest to implement parameter: - impound_car(time) - impound_license(time) - impound_license_and_car(time) - impound_license_and_all_cars_owned(time)