4 ms·

That's a little naive. Local jurisdictions are heavily incentivized to hand out infractions of any kind -- deserved or not. Why? Because they keep the money.

That's a little naive. Local jurisdictions are heavily incentivized to hand out infractions of any kind -- deserved or not. Why? Because they keep the money. What do they spend the money on? Things like public employees and their benefits, including pensions. It's clearly a perverse incentive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive I've always thought that government shouldn't benefit from fines or seized property. I'm not sure what a good solution is. Perhaps they should take the money from fines and just light it on fire. There shouldn't be a financial incentive for governments to hand out tickets and fines and seize property - the democratic incentive should be enough.

caprad 13y ago
> That's a little naive. Are you saying it is impossible to escape their devious plans, because I have managed to avoid a parking or speeding fine for the last 20 years, simply by following the rules.
- dangrossman 13y ago
  It's easy to avoid being ticketed by an incompetent/corrupt parking authority by simply not living in the city they're employed in. You can even keep that up for millennia! That doesn't mean they never give out unjust tickets to the people that do live there.
  - stinkytaco 13y ago
    It's also easy to chalk up thousands of perfectly legitimate parking tickets to a few incompetent/corrupt parking authorities that you have no evidence exist except anecdotal experiences. I’ve now read a half a dozen comments in this thread that I can sum up as "I once got a parking ticket that I shouldn't have, all parking authorities are incompetent and corrupt." No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket or to address the issue with your locally elected official.
    - dangrossman 13y ago
      > No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket I think that's exactly what the person I responded to was saying. If obeying the law never results in being issued a ticket, there's no reason they should allow tickets to be challenged.
      - stinkytaco 13y ago
        I'm not sure where you get that at all. I really see no one anywhere saying anything like that. The starter of this thread is clearly being tongue in cheek. The next person was addressing that by arguing that corruption causes people to get unnecessary parking tickets. The next one was saying that he was overstating that because he himself had managed to avoid that (side note: so have I). I don't think: "you should not be allowed any redress on parking tickets" was ever broached. What I take out of this is that there are bad parking tickets and there is a system for dealing with bad parking tickets. No system is perfect, all systems have compromises, design flaws and humans who make real mistakes implementing them. Accepting this I personally feel revenue from parking tickets is an excellent way to keep taxes lower. I happen to see this process in action as part of my employment, so perhaps I am biased. I have also seen places who basically feel the way you do about parking enforcement and I do not like it (I’m looking at New York here). I will take the tradeoffs and if I choose not to, I will address the problems with my elected officials whose job it is to oversee the budget process to avoid exactly the kinds of corruption we’re speculating exists.
        dangrossman 13y ago
        > corruption we’re speculating exists We're not speculating. I live in a suburb of Philadelphia. Last summer our traffic courts were permanently closed, their cases turned over to the municipal court system. 9 of the traffic court judges, and 3 other city officials, were indicted on criminal charges related to fraud and corruption.
        stinkytaco 13y ago
        Good, I'm sure they should be indicted. But that does not indict all parking tickets everywhere or the system of issuing parking tickets. It indicts a suburb of Philadelphia. It's like saying that when a sports official gets a call wrong (or even worse, is corrupt), it indicts every team that's ever played that sport and the very act of playing that sport.
parennoob 13y ago
"I've always thought that government shouldn't benefit from fines or seized property. I'm not sure what a good solution is. Perhaps they should take the money from fines and just light it on fire." In the case of parking violations, it could go towards directly subsidizing the cost of legal parking -- building new structures, etc. That way, you're not creating a perverse incentive of people directly benefitting from the fines they issue.
- binarycrusader 13y ago
  That's still a perverse incentive; more money in the department who owns that parking budget.
ivanplenty 13y ago
Agreed. I've always wondered how differently municipalities would behave were the fines forbidden from funding operations. For example, what if all fines had to be paid to a trust, and only the interest from the trust may be used for capital projects? Then only taxes could be used to pay for operations. At the federal level this change wouldn't make a big difference, but at the local level it would affect 50% of some budgets. I imagine a lot of what seems like frivolous ticketing would shift towards something else. Edit: @stinkytaco -- Agreed. Maybe frivolous tickets would be replaced with frivolous taxes? The money does have to come from somewhere, and I agree that the vast majority of civil servants are just enforcing otherwise reasonable laws :) Still a fun thought experiment.
- stinkytaco 13y ago
  Taxes would be higher, for one. Instead of using that revenue, they would reduce services or raise taxes. When a city department draws up its budget for the year, one of the things they need to account for is expected revenue. Budgets are set based on that revenue. If that revenue were not there, something would have to give. It's not like they are walking into your driveway and giving you a ticket. People who get tickets are parked illegally. Those who are not are welcome to challenge the ticket and not pay it.
stinkytaco 13y ago
As someone who works for local government, I think you are over thinking "heavily incentivized". Governments are heavily incentivized to respond to political whims. It's the reason NYC has free street parking and that North Dakota has no parking meters, despite some cities desperately needing them. The fact that it's so easy to be released from a parking ticket is proof that this isn't some cash cow localities are sitting on. I frankly see no problem with citizens benefiting from people who don't think parking laws should apply to them through the increased services and lower taxes gained by parking revenue.

caprad 13y ago

> That's a little naive. Are you saying it is impossible to escape their devious plans, because I have managed to avoid a parking or speeding fine for the last 20 years, simply by following the rules.

dangrossman 13y ago
It's easy to avoid being ticketed by an incompetent/corrupt parking authority by simply not living in the city they're employed in. You can even keep that up for millennia! That doesn't mean they never give out unjust tickets to the people that do live there.
- stinkytaco 13y ago
  It's also easy to chalk up thousands of perfectly legitimate parking tickets to a few incompetent/corrupt parking authorities that you have no evidence exist except anecdotal experiences. I’ve now read a half a dozen comments in this thread that I can sum up as "I once got a parking ticket that I shouldn't have, all parking authorities are incompetent and corrupt." No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket or to address the issue with your locally elected official.
  - dangrossman 13y ago
    > No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket I think that's exactly what the person I responded to was saying. If obeying the law never results in being issued a ticket, there's no reason they should allow tickets to be challenged.
    - stinkytaco 13y ago
      I'm not sure where you get that at all. I really see no one anywhere saying anything like that. The starter of this thread is clearly being tongue in cheek. The next person was addressing that by arguing that corruption causes people to get unnecessary parking tickets. The next one was saying that he was overstating that because he himself had managed to avoid that (side note: so have I). I don't think: "you should not be allowed any redress on parking tickets" was ever broached. What I take out of this is that there are bad parking tickets and there is a system for dealing with bad parking tickets. No system is perfect, all systems have compromises, design flaws and humans who make real mistakes implementing them. Accepting this I personally feel revenue from parking tickets is an excellent way to keep taxes lower. I happen to see this process in action as part of my employment, so perhaps I am biased. I have also seen places who basically feel the way you do about parking enforcement and I do not like it (I’m looking at New York here). I will take the tradeoffs and if I choose not to, I will address the problems with my elected officials whose job it is to oversee the budget process to avoid exactly the kinds of corruption we’re speculating exists.
      - dangrossman 13y ago
        > corruption we’re speculating exists We're not speculating. I live in a suburb of Philadelphia. Last summer our traffic courts were permanently closed, their cases turned over to the municipal court system. 9 of the traffic court judges, and 3 other city officials, were indicted on criminal charges related to fraud and corruption.
        stinkytaco 13y ago
        Good, I'm sure they should be indicted. But that does not indict all parking tickets everywhere or the system of issuing parking tickets. It indicts a suburb of Philadelphia. It's like saying that when a sports official gets a call wrong (or even worse, is corrupt), it indicts every team that's ever played that sport and the very act of playing that sport.

parennoob 13y ago

"I've always thought that government shouldn't benefit from fines or seized property. I'm not sure what a good solution is. Perhaps they should take the money from fines and just light it on fire." In the case of parking violations, it could go towards directly subsidizing the cost of legal parking -- building new structures, etc. That way, you're not creating a perverse incentive of people directly benefitting from the fines they issue.

binarycrusader 13y ago
That's still a perverse incentive; more money in the department who owns that parking budget.

ivanplenty 13y ago

Agreed. I've always wondered how differently municipalities would behave were the fines forbidden from funding operations. For example, what if all fines had to be paid to a trust, and only the interest from the trust may be used for capital projects? Then only taxes could be used to pay for operations. At the federal level this change wouldn't make a big difference, but at the local level it would affect 50% of some budgets. I imagine a lot of what seems like frivolous ticketing would shift towards something else. Edit: @stinkytaco -- Agreed. Maybe frivolous tickets would be replaced with frivolous taxes? The money does have to come from somewhere, and I agree that the vast majority of civil servants are just enforcing otherwise reasonable laws :) Still a fun thought experiment.

stinkytaco 13y ago
Taxes would be higher, for one. Instead of using that revenue, they would reduce services or raise taxes. When a city department draws up its budget for the year, one of the things they need to account for is expected revenue. Budgets are set based on that revenue. If that revenue were not there, something would have to give. It's not like they are walking into your driveway and giving you a ticket. People who get tickets are parked illegally. Those who are not are welcome to challenge the ticket and not pay it.

stinkytaco 13y ago

As someone who works for local government, I think you are over thinking "heavily incentivized". Governments are heavily incentivized to respond to political whims. It's the reason NYC has free street parking and that North Dakota has no parking meters, despite some cities desperately needing them. The fact that it's so easy to be released from a parking ticket is proof that this isn't some cash cow localities are sitting on. I frankly see no problem with citizens benefiting from people who don't think parking laws should apply to them through the increased services and lower taxes gained by parking revenue.