5 ms·

The fines for driving in the US are absurdly low in general. Through our laws incentivizing driving cars at every stage we have created a car centric society. P

The fines for driving in the US are absurdly low in general. Through our laws incentivizing driving cars at every stage we have created a car centric society. Part of this is our laws with low fines and punishments. Realistically, someone texting and driving should have their license revoked, and probably a 4 or 5 figure fine. And many other driving offenses should as well.

nickthegreek 4y ago
Fines unfairly affect the poor. The punishment should be community service, say highway trash pickup.
- triceratops 4y ago
  Not sure how that's better. Poor people are more likely to have jobs with inflexible hours.
  - dsfyu404ed 4y ago
    Because when you're poor getting screwed out of hundreds of dollars because Karen who has the ear of legislators thinks we need to be tough on on <class of petty misdbehavior> causes a cascading problem in which you have to choose who to stiff (landlord? utilities? phone bill?) this month, who to stiff slightly less next month, etc, etc as you get back on track. It's like perverse version of that 9-square tile puzzle with one tile missing where if you make any wrong moves your standard of living gets kicked down substantially and you spend months to years getting your financial stability back to where it was. Getting screwed out of 4-8hr of your time is much less likely to make your standard of living and financial stability slide backwards in a way that takes many months to a year to correct. Of course the majority of support for people who are in favor of anything other than the status quo comes from people who want petty stuff to be maximally life-interrupting so....
    - triceratops 4y ago
      What if you get fired from your job because your mandatory community service is at the same time as your shift? All I'm saying is it's not clear-cut that community service is less disruptive to the poor than a fine. Maybe the fine should be a percentage of your income instead of a fixed number, as is done in some places.
    - prirun 4y ago
      > thinks we need to be tough on on <class of petty misdbehavior> I can see your point, so instead of increasing the fine for texting, I would be fine with losing your license permanently if you are using a phone while driving (talking or texting) and are at fault (any percentage) in an accident.
- q845712 4y ago
  sliding scale? https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/in-finland-speeding-tickets-are-linked-to-your-income/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/in-finland-speeding-t... Almost any penalty one can come up with will be harder for the already-disadvantaged, and still shrugged off by someone with sufficient resources.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  Imagine how fast public transport would improve if we just skipped fines and handed out multi year license bans instead. Would disproportionately affect rich people living in suburbs.
  - dsfyu404ed 4y ago
    >Would disproportionately affect rich people living in suburbs. I.e. the people who are financially secure enough to have spare fucks to give about matters of principal rather than economic survival. Legislatures that want to get reelected can't just screw those people. It's a long slow process of divide and conqueror and pulling that off assumed continued political will.
- cozzyd 4y ago
  Just fine x% the value of the car being driven.
notch898a 4y ago
The standard of proof in non-criminal US traffic courts is usually "preponderance of the evidence" and the various problems that entails. For license revocation it's even lower as that's administrative. I've been fined near 4 figures on the basis that "the cop says he counted the lines and time it took to pass them." Fix the courts before making the fines higher.
- prirun 4y ago
  In the case of my accident, the driver was clearly 100% at fault and did not dispute that. She should permanently lose her license for all the damage she caused.
cozzyd 4y ago
Absurdly, people think speed or red light cameras that automatically ticket are some insane thing. Here in Chicago people complain that you get a ticket for going 6+ mph over the speed limit, as if that is somehow not really speeding...
- ultrarunner 4y ago
  Speed limits often seem entirely arbitrary, and specifically with red light cameras municipalities have been repeatedly caught shortening yellow-light durations to increase ticket revenue. I'm personally not convinced (and along with me, evidently, the vast majority of other drivers) that operating a vehicle to the letter of the law is the most salient way toward reducing traffic deaths. I would much, much rather see a reframing of the way people approach cars, including a reduction in car dependency and a CDL requirement for vehicles over a certain dimensions or weight (I have lifted trucks in mind).
  - cozzyd 4y ago
    > Speed limits often seem entirely arbitrary, and specifically with red light cameras municipalities have been repeatedly caught shortening yellow-light durations to increase ticket revenue. Insofar as these are problems, this is an implementation detail about how to do it properly. > I'm personally not convinced (and along with me, evidently, the vast majority of other drivers) that operating a vehicle to the letter of the law is the most salient way toward reducing traffic deaths. I would much, much rather see a reframing of the way people approach cars, including a reduction in car dependency and a CDL requirement for vehicles over a certain dimensions or weight (I have lifted trucks in mind). Sure, those things would also help and I'm in favor of them. But cars speeding and running red lights is extremely dangerous to me as a pedestrian or cyclist. As we found out in 2020, reducing the number of people on the road just makes the people on the road drive even more insanely.
    - Dylan16807 4y ago
      > Insofar as these are problems, this is an implementation detail about how to do it properly. Sure. It still makes the cameras insane in practice. And the introduction of red light cameras is, in a statistical sense, not just annoying but dangerous.

nickthegreek 4y ago

Fines unfairly affect the poor. The punishment should be community service, say highway trash pickup.

triceratops 4y ago
Not sure how that's better. Poor people are more likely to have jobs with inflexible hours.
- dsfyu404ed 4y ago
  Because when you're poor getting screwed out of hundreds of dollars because Karen who has the ear of legislators thinks we need to be tough on on <class of petty misdbehavior> causes a cascading problem in which you have to choose who to stiff (landlord? utilities? phone bill?) this month, who to stiff slightly less next month, etc, etc as you get back on track. It's like perverse version of that 9-square tile puzzle with one tile missing where if you make any wrong moves your standard of living gets kicked down substantially and you spend months to years getting your financial stability back to where it was. Getting screwed out of 4-8hr of your time is much less likely to make your standard of living and financial stability slide backwards in a way that takes many months to a year to correct. Of course the majority of support for people who are in favor of anything other than the status quo comes from people who want petty stuff to be maximally life-interrupting so....
  - triceratops 4y ago
    What if you get fired from your job because your mandatory community service is at the same time as your shift? All I'm saying is it's not clear-cut that community service is less disruptive to the poor than a fine. Maybe the fine should be a percentage of your income instead of a fixed number, as is done in some places.
  - prirun 4y ago
    > thinks we need to be tough on on <class of petty misdbehavior> I can see your point, so instead of increasing the fine for texting, I would be fine with losing your license permanently if you are using a phone while driving (talking or texting) and are at fault (any percentage) in an accident.
q845712 4y ago
sliding scale? https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/in-finland-speeding-tickets-are-linked-to-your-income/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/in-finland-speeding-t... Almost any penalty one can come up with will be harder for the already-disadvantaged, and still shrugged off by someone with sufficient resources.
Gigachad 4y ago
Imagine how fast public transport would improve if we just skipped fines and handed out multi year license bans instead. Would disproportionately affect rich people living in suburbs.
- dsfyu404ed 4y ago
  >Would disproportionately affect rich people living in suburbs. I.e. the people who are financially secure enough to have spare fucks to give about matters of principal rather than economic survival. Legislatures that want to get reelected can't just screw those people. It's a long slow process of divide and conqueror and pulling that off assumed continued political will.
cozzyd 4y ago
Just fine x% the value of the car being driven.

notch898a 4y ago

The standard of proof in non-criminal US traffic courts is usually "preponderance of the evidence" and the various problems that entails. For license revocation it's even lower as that's administrative. I've been fined near 4 figures on the basis that "the cop says he counted the lines and time it took to pass them." Fix the courts before making the fines higher.

prirun 4y ago
In the case of my accident, the driver was clearly 100% at fault and did not dispute that. She should permanently lose her license for all the damage she caused.

cozzyd 4y ago

Absurdly, people think speed or red light cameras that automatically ticket are some insane thing. Here in Chicago people complain that you get a ticket for going 6+ mph over the speed limit, as if that is somehow not really speeding...

ultrarunner 4y ago
Speed limits often seem entirely arbitrary, and specifically with red light cameras municipalities have been repeatedly caught shortening yellow-light durations to increase ticket revenue. I'm personally not convinced (and along with me, evidently, the vast majority of other drivers) that operating a vehicle to the letter of the law is the most salient way toward reducing traffic deaths. I would much, much rather see a reframing of the way people approach cars, including a reduction in car dependency and a CDL requirement for vehicles over a certain dimensions or weight (I have lifted trucks in mind).
- cozzyd 4y ago
  > Speed limits often seem entirely arbitrary, and specifically with red light cameras municipalities have been repeatedly caught shortening yellow-light durations to increase ticket revenue. Insofar as these are problems, this is an implementation detail about how to do it properly. > I'm personally not convinced (and along with me, evidently, the vast majority of other drivers) that operating a vehicle to the letter of the law is the most salient way toward reducing traffic deaths. I would much, much rather see a reframing of the way people approach cars, including a reduction in car dependency and a CDL requirement for vehicles over a certain dimensions or weight (I have lifted trucks in mind). Sure, those things would also help and I'm in favor of them. But cars speeding and running red lights is extremely dangerous to me as a pedestrian or cyclist. As we found out in 2020, reducing the number of people on the road just makes the people on the road drive even more insanely.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    > Insofar as these are problems, this is an implementation detail about how to do it properly. Sure. It still makes the cameras insane in practice. And the introduction of red light cameras is, in a statistical sense, not just annoying but dangerous.