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>Actual consequences would be a good start to addressing this. Sorry, but no they wouldn't. They might make YOU feel better, but it would do VERY little to so
by Enginerrrd 6y ago
>Actual consequences would be a good start to addressing this.
Sorry, but no they wouldn't. They might make YOU feel better, but it would do VERY little to solve the problem. In fact, I'd bet a fair amount of money that you'd end up with deadlier vehicle vs pedestrian accidents because you'd dramatically increase the number of hit-and-runs, reducing the number of pedestrians that receive prompt care.
The consequences are already quite severe, though subject to some uncertainty and heavily based on the circumstances of the accident which... is probably pretty appropriate. In basically every other context in criminal policy, increasing penalties beyond a certain point really doesn't affect the underlying rate of the target crime by very much, and can actually be harmful. Three strikes laws are a good example where a run-of-the-mill crime gets turned into a situation where you might as well go for broke and murder every policeman you see because you're going to prison for life anyway so criminals are incentivized to do whatever they can do to escape.
- willhslade 6y agoIn NYC, you're wrong. https://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-perfect-crime-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast/ https://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-perfect-crime-a-new-fre...
- Enginerrrd 6y agoBased on your source, that seems very much up for debate. Also, those statistics probably don't include civil liabilities which can be significant. But... this quote says it all: "While 25 percent of pedestrian deaths are attributed to the driver’s failure to yield, pedestrian behavior looks pretty bad too — they lie down in the street, dart into the road, cross improperly, and so on" So it would make sense, at least ostensibly, that the majority of drivers receive little punishment. Now, in a place like New York, I have a hard time believing that in the majority of instances drivers are the only witnesses.
- p49k 6y agoAgreed. The most effective solution to this problem is designing infrastructure that intuitively trains people to drive better - narrower roads force people to pay more attention, for example. More speed bumps, more roundabouts, lower speed limits and better enforcement, etc.
- Enginerrrd 6y agoAs a civil engineer, I totally agree!
- dghlsakjg 6y agoYou might have missed the point. The point is that if you kill someone with a car, authorities are FAR more likely to write it off as an ‘accident’ with no charges filed than any other time one person dies at the hand of another. The actual consequences would be charging someone appropriately with vehicular manslaughter. The point was that killing someone with a car is a crime that is almost never prosecuted, not that the penalties are too low.