4 ms·

Perfectly equal enforcement really isn't possible, but it should be the policy to enforce in proportion to active harm. The bigger the ongoing active harm, the

Perfectly equal enforcement really isn't possible, but it should be the policy to enforce in proportion to active harm. The bigger the ongoing active harm, the quicker to react we should be. Some individual torrents a single movie? NBD. No matter the side of the argument you are on this should be ignored. A company intentionally throws content strikes causing legitimate harm to large numbers of content creators? That should addressed. Reality should always have a place in the law.

deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
GolfPopper 2mo ago
Finland links speeding fines to income. I'd like to see something that get far broader application. That prevents the wealthy or huge corporations from seeing lawbreaking as a business cost, without destroying a small business or individual who commits the same crime.
- AnthonyMouse 2mo ago
  Proposals like this are how you get the billionaire paying their chauffeur's $50 fines so they can get everywhere faster while sticking some small business owner in an industry with feast or famine years with a $50,000 ticket for having a slightly miscalibrated speedometer. Creating new arbitrage opportunities benefits the powerful, not the weak.
  - collingreen 2mo ago
    It is a common complaint that fixed penalties are just the fee the rich get to pay to break the law. Doubly so for big corporations especially when the penalties are less than the gain they got doing the harm. It sounds like you're implying that it is impossible to create a system that makes penalties scale instead of just being a fee because the system will always be gamed. Do you believe that or did I misunderstand you?
    - AnthonyMouse 2mo ago
      It's a common complaint but the complaint is ridiculous because the penalties already scale with the scope of the activity. It's typical when you sue a corporation for the penalty for willful violations to be treble damages, i.e. three times the actual damages. If you rip customers off by $10,000 then you pay $30,000. If you're huge and rip customers off by $10 billion then you pay $30 billion. Whereas the proposal is typically to make the penalties scale with entity size, which a) is actually easier to game than the scope of the harmful activity, and b) does a bunch of things that make no sense, like increasing the amount of the fine for an oil spill if the company also generates additional revenue from producing solar panels. The reason we run into trouble here usually isn't that the penalties are wrong, it's that the enforcement is weak. If you can steal $10 billion with only a 10% chance of enforcement that requires you to give back $30 billion then your expected value is an $8 billion gain. But that has nothing to do with the scale of the business. The exact same thing happens to with a company that steals $10,000 with only a 10% chance of enforcement. And using disproportionate penalties doesn't really fix it either, because then they just roll the dice and file for bankruptcy if they encounter enforcement. You can't fine them more money than they actually have. When the rate of enforcement is too low, that isn't enough to make them comply, because a small chance of -100% is profitable against a large chance of +50%. Whereas if enforcement is consistent then disproportionate penalties aren't even necessary.
      - account42 2mo ago
        Penalties are not just to compensate for the harm done but also to incentivize against doing the harm in the first place. This only works if penalties * p(getting convicted) > profit. p(getting convicted) very much depends no the size of the entity so penalties need to be increased accordingly to attain the same deterrent effect. Being able to game a naive implementation of such scaling is not an argument for not scaling penalties but for designing the concrete implementation to be hard to game and/or applying even higher penalties when someone has been found to try to game the system - which is something that should be done more in general. We can absolutely make it so that people hiring private chauffeurs share in the liability for breaking traffic laws just like we can absolutely hold CEOs liable for illegal activities done by employees under their purview.
  - FireBeyond 2mo ago
    This isn't arbitrage, it's looking for loopholes. Presumably your "feast or famine" business owner did the responsible thing with leveling their income, no? They didn't? Oh, why would that be the public's concern. That would level out in their feasting years, after all (assuming you're using the previous year's taxable income, or an average income over the previous three years or so). The chauffeur is subject to the rules around their CDL or similar, or is in service of their employer. When driving a work vehicle, my fines are already directed at my employer. It blows my mind how much we are willing to bend over backwards to ensure the powerful won't suffer a moment's inconvenience in this country.
    - GolfPopper 2mo ago
      "John Steinbeck once said that socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires." Not quite how he phrased it, but close. Original is here: https://wist.info/steinbeck-john/46582/ https://wist.info/steinbeck-john/46582/
      - geodel 2mo ago
        Ok, how did it work our for countries where it did took root?
        jacquesm 2mo ago
        Good enough, France, the Nordics and many other countries besides have done well.
        mlrtime 2mo ago
        "Done well", but not as good as the US. [depending on which stats you cherry-pick] The US was always about dreamers taking big risks for big rewards. There are a lot of things that can be fixed that don't remove that ceiling that other countries have.
      - opo 2mo ago
  - Hnrobert42 2mo ago
    So then you outlaw that, too. It is an idea with merit to be refined not rejected outright because you found the one flaw. Under the current system, the wealthy can speed themsleves and pay small fines.
- charcircuit 2mo ago
  In the US speeding can lead to your license being removed and then you can't drive at all. Speeding is not just a fine.
  - jmward01 2mo ago
    Again, this is a wealth tax. Rich get driven around and don't loose their jobs for loosing their license. Try being poor though and having this happen. Edit: should have said 'poor tax'
    - charcircuit 2mo ago
      Being poor is no excuse for breaking the law. If you can't afford having your license revoked then don't do things that can get your license revoked.
      - khriss 2mo ago
        Quick question, without looking it up, can you list the number of laws you can break which will result in your license revocation? The law is sufficiently complex and broad that there is essentially zero chance that you are not breaking a single one each day. The rich have gotten so powerful that can literally evade the consequences forever in most cases. For the rest of us, all we can hope is to avoid the scrutiny of the law.
      - account42 2mo ago
        That's a straw man though. The argument isn't that poor people should get to break traffic laws but that those who can afford to loose their license shouldn't get to break them either.
opello 2mo ago
[dead]
charcircuit 2mo ago
Perfect may not be possible but with AI society will be able to scale law enforcement to way more than what a few individual officers can handle.
- chanux 2mo ago
  And it will still have the amazing characteristics we see today.

deleted 2mo ago

[deleted]

GolfPopper 2mo ago

Finland links speeding fines to income. I'd like to see something that get far broader application. That prevents the wealthy or huge corporations from seeing lawbreaking as a business cost, without destroying a small business or individual who commits the same crime.

AnthonyMouse 2mo ago
Proposals like this are how you get the billionaire paying their chauffeur's $50 fines so they can get everywhere faster while sticking some small business owner in an industry with feast or famine years with a $50,000 ticket for having a slightly miscalibrated speedometer. Creating new arbitrage opportunities benefits the powerful, not the weak.
- collingreen 2mo ago
  It is a common complaint that fixed penalties are just the fee the rich get to pay to break the law. Doubly so for big corporations especially when the penalties are less than the gain they got doing the harm. It sounds like you're implying that it is impossible to create a system that makes penalties scale instead of just being a fee because the system will always be gamed. Do you believe that or did I misunderstand you?
  - AnthonyMouse 2mo ago
    It's a common complaint but the complaint is ridiculous because the penalties already scale with the scope of the activity. It's typical when you sue a corporation for the penalty for willful violations to be treble damages, i.e. three times the actual damages. If you rip customers off by $10,000 then you pay $30,000. If you're huge and rip customers off by $10 billion then you pay $30 billion. Whereas the proposal is typically to make the penalties scale with entity size, which a) is actually easier to game than the scope of the harmful activity, and b) does a bunch of things that make no sense, like increasing the amount of the fine for an oil spill if the company also generates additional revenue from producing solar panels. The reason we run into trouble here usually isn't that the penalties are wrong, it's that the enforcement is weak. If you can steal $10 billion with only a 10% chance of enforcement that requires you to give back $30 billion then your expected value is an $8 billion gain. But that has nothing to do with the scale of the business. The exact same thing happens to with a company that steals $10,000 with only a 10% chance of enforcement. And using disproportionate penalties doesn't really fix it either, because then they just roll the dice and file for bankruptcy if they encounter enforcement. You can't fine them more money than they actually have. When the rate of enforcement is too low, that isn't enough to make them comply, because a small chance of -100% is profitable against a large chance of +50%. Whereas if enforcement is consistent then disproportionate penalties aren't even necessary.
    - account42 2mo ago
      Penalties are not just to compensate for the harm done but also to incentivize against doing the harm in the first place. This only works if penalties * p(getting convicted) > profit. p(getting convicted) very much depends no the size of the entity so penalties need to be increased accordingly to attain the same deterrent effect. Being able to game a naive implementation of such scaling is not an argument for not scaling penalties but for designing the concrete implementation to be hard to game and/or applying even higher penalties when someone has been found to try to game the system - which is something that should be done more in general. We can absolutely make it so that people hiring private chauffeurs share in the liability for breaking traffic laws just like we can absolutely hold CEOs liable for illegal activities done by employees under their purview.
- FireBeyond 2mo ago
  This isn't arbitrage, it's looking for loopholes. Presumably your "feast or famine" business owner did the responsible thing with leveling their income, no? They didn't? Oh, why would that be the public's concern. That would level out in their feasting years, after all (assuming you're using the previous year's taxable income, or an average income over the previous three years or so). The chauffeur is subject to the rules around their CDL or similar, or is in service of their employer. When driving a work vehicle, my fines are already directed at my employer. It blows my mind how much we are willing to bend over backwards to ensure the powerful won't suffer a moment's inconvenience in this country.
  - GolfPopper 2mo ago
    "John Steinbeck once said that socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires." Not quite how he phrased it, but close. Original is here: https://wist.info/steinbeck-john/46582/ https://wist.info/steinbeck-john/46582/
    - geodel 2mo ago
      Ok, how did it work our for countries where it did took root?
      - jacquesm 2mo ago
        Good enough, France, the Nordics and many other countries besides have done well.
        mlrtime 2mo ago
        "Done well", but not as good as the US. [depending on which stats you cherry-pick] The US was always about dreamers taking big risks for big rewards. There are a lot of things that can be fixed that don't remove that ceiling that other countries have.
    - opo 2mo ago
- Hnrobert42 2mo ago
  So then you outlaw that, too. It is an idea with merit to be refined not rejected outright because you found the one flaw. Under the current system, the wealthy can speed themsleves and pay small fines.
charcircuit 2mo ago
In the US speeding can lead to your license being removed and then you can't drive at all. Speeding is not just a fine.
- jmward01 2mo ago
  Again, this is a wealth tax. Rich get driven around and don't loose their jobs for loosing their license. Try being poor though and having this happen. Edit: should have said 'poor tax'
  - charcircuit 2mo ago
    Being poor is no excuse for breaking the law. If you can't afford having your license revoked then don't do things that can get your license revoked.
    - khriss 2mo ago
      Quick question, without looking it up, can you list the number of laws you can break which will result in your license revocation? The law is sufficiently complex and broad that there is essentially zero chance that you are not breaking a single one each day. The rich have gotten so powerful that can literally evade the consequences forever in most cases. For the rest of us, all we can hope is to avoid the scrutiny of the law.
    - account42 2mo ago
      That's a straw man though. The argument isn't that poor people should get to break traffic laws but that those who can afford to loose their license shouldn't get to break them either.

opello 2mo ago

[dead]

charcircuit 2mo ago

Perfect may not be possible but with AI society will be able to scale law enforcement to way more than what a few individual officers can handle.

chanux 2mo ago
And it will still have the amazing characteristics we see today.