If you have $1000, a $200 fine is 20% of your money.
If you have $2,000,000 a fine of $200 is . 0001% of your money, basically nothing.
This means that, relative to their money, a poorer person hurts more from the same fine. This is a BAD IDEA for enforcing rules everyone is supposed to follow. Essentially, we’re encouraging people to drive slow, unless they can pay the toll for speeding.
There are ways to mitigate this - sliding scale fines, for instance. I personally don’t like fines as punishments in general, though. I’d rather use neutral traffic calming features, that always invariably impact people who use the route the same, and make it a criminal offense to drive recklessly, akin to drunk driving.
“A multimillionaire businessman has been hit with one of the world’s highest speeding fines – €121,000 (£104,000) – for driving 30km/h (18.6mph) over the limit in Finland, where tickets are calculated as a percentage of the offender’s income.”
I address all of this in other areas in this thread. I don’t feel like rehashing it with you, given your unwarranted aggression out of the gate. If you want to read some actual rebuttal, go for it. Otherwise, enjoy your life.
Sorry if it sounded aggressive. This topic hits close because I have at least 2 very close friends that continuously ignore speed limits and no argument dissuades them of the “speed limits are a way of controlling the people, and fines are just for the police to earn money” mindset, et al. And I feel they’ll have a nasty accident one day
I didn’t say it was created to hinder the poor.
I said fines DISPROPORTIONATELY PUNISH THE POOR.
If you have $1000, a $200 fine is 20% of your money.
If you have $2,000,000 a fine of $200 is . 0001% of your money, basically nothing.
This means that, relative to their money, a poorer person hurts more from the same fine. This is a BAD IDEA for enforcing rules everyone is supposed to follow. Essentially, we’re encouraging people to drive slow, unless they can pay the toll for speeding.
There are ways to mitigate this - sliding scale fines, for instance. I personally don’t like fines as punishments in general, though. I’d rather use neutral traffic calming features, that always invariably impact people who use the route the same, and make it a criminal offense to drive recklessly, akin to drunk driving.
Finland have it sorted:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/finnish-businessman-hit-with-121000-speeding-fine
“A multimillionaire businessman has been hit with one of the world’s highest speeding fines – €121,000 (£104,000) – for driving 30km/h (18.6mph) over the limit in Finland, where tickets are calculated as a percentage of the offender’s income.”
I don’t disagree it’s disproportionate. But you know how rich and poor can avoid fines? Just fucking respect the limits
People should follow the law because it benefits everyone not because they want to avoid a fine
I address all of this in other areas in this thread. I don’t feel like rehashing it with you, given your unwarranted aggression out of the gate. If you want to read some actual rebuttal, go for it. Otherwise, enjoy your life.
Sorry if it sounded aggressive. This topic hits close because I have at least 2 very close friends that continuously ignore speed limits and no argument dissuades them of the “speed limits are a way of controlling the people, and fines are just for the police to earn money” mindset, et al. And I feel they’ll have a nasty accident one day