4 ms·
That is a utilitarian argument, but did you really think it through? If you drive a car, you increase the risk of cyclists and pedestrians to get hurt or kille
by slow_typist 2y ago
That is a utilitarian argument, but did you really think it through?
If you drive a car, you increase the risk of cyclists and pedestrians to get hurt or killed. Hurting or killing pedestrians also harms the society in several ways. Tax the car sales appropriately to the risk imposed on individuals and the society and you have enough money for bollards.
- olalonde 2y agoIt depends on cost. If the tax required to place bollards everywhere possible amounted to 1M$ per car, would that be a reasonable tax?
- PeterSmit 2y agoIf the harm to society is 1M$ per car, should we be driving them at all?
- olalonde 2y agoNo, we shouldn't. But the cost of installing bollards and the "harm to society" are two distinct costs. There are about 2.37 pedestrian deaths per billion vehicle miles traveled in America. Even if we assign a generous cost of 5M$ per life lost, that only amounts to a 0.01$ per mile driven, which is probably not enough to cover the cost of installing bollards all over the place.
- slow_typist 2y agoHow about 10 bollards per sold car, you can probably get away with $ 1k per bollard (including installation), most cars cost a multiple of 10k. Let‘s see how far that gets you. You can of course modify the bollard tax by car weight or by price.
- michaelmior 2y agoSo $10K extra per car? Assuming we're talking the US here where the average price of a new car is under $50K, that's more than a 20% bollard tax.
- slow_typist 2y agoThe average price is really that low? Do you have any pointers/data?
- michaelmior 2y agoThis Fortune article[0] lists an average as of January of $47,338, I believe based on Kelley Blue Book. [0] https://fortune.com/2024/02/28/how-expensive-new-used-cars-outlook-forecast/ https://fortune.com/2024/02/28/how-expensive-new-used-cars-o...
- TheCoelacanth 2y agoIf you can't afford to protect people from cars, then you can't afford cars.
- dazc 2y agoProtecting people from cars could be done by enforcing existing laws regarding unsafe driving habits and increasing the penalties to a point where the worst drivers are simply priced out of the equation.
- bryanlarsen 2y agoAccidents happen, even to safe drivers. But you could make the roads virtually fatality-free by lowering speed limits and shared roads to 30km/h (20mph) and enforcing that speed limit.