... the kindler-gentler traffic ticket revenue program ~

I agree! It does drive everyone else nuts though.

 

So...if a poor person commits murder they should only get 1 year probation, but if a rich person commits the same murder it's life...without parole. Tell me how this is different than traffic violation rates based on income.

 

Rich people have more money, not immortality. Both rich and poor have around the same amount of years of life. Charging one person 1 year of parole and the other essentially 30 to 50 years of his life in prison when both are going to live around 75 years isn't fair.

I never said the rich should be charged more. What I'm saying is that charging a rich person a $180 for a speeding ticket isn't going to make much of a difference in their habits, whereas charging someone poor that much might mean going for a month without food. How is making a poor person go a month without food but take away a couple of nights of eating out from a rich person fair?

Nothing is fair. The question shouldn't even be about what is fair. The question is, if the goal is to keep people from speeding what will keep people from speeding? Keeping me from eating for a month worked. I'm not sure how'd you enforce that with everyone though.

 

Would you like to start off by telling us how it's the same?

 

rich people can afford better attorneys

 

Same crime...same time. As to the better Lawyer comment...then the same ticket does cost the "better off" more money...just going into different pockets. Life is not fair...deal with it. You make your own destiny.

 

i was talking about murder, not speeding tickets

 

I still haven't seen an explanation of how to compare public policy implications between ordinance violations and violent felonies, or between fines and carceral sentences.

 

I think one thing that makes this all controversial is that the consequences have nothing to do with the offense, at least in the case of traffic violations.

With murder, soul for soul or life for life makes logical sense. I'm not saying that that should be the one and only consequence for murder, but it is logical.

But money for speeding? Did speeding cost the government more money? How do you prove that?

Statistically, speeding does increase the probability of a deadly accident. I think it would be more logical to educate people on that, not tell them that speeding just costs more if they catch you. And then, after such education, treat people who speed as reckless. Perhaps if they've been caught speeding tell them that if they get into an accident from speeding and that accident causes death or injury then eye for eye, tooth for tooth and soul for soul. If you've been caught several times speeding and end up killing someone then you should be accountable for intentional manslaughter.

 

I've driven pickup trucks since I was 14.
I drive one to work this morning - and it got over 20MPG.
Most pickups, even older, used ones get high teens to low twenties.

You see relatively few Toyota hybrids in red-dirt country because gas is generally cheaper and hybrids are generally NOT.
They get sold in places where gas is more than $2.50 a gallon in todays' prices.
Besides....working people can use a pickup as a car but not the other way around.

I said in this very forum that my last truck would BE my last truck - but in 2023 I did a full, detailed cost-benefit analysis between my base 2023 GMC and a Base Tesla 3 and after 5 years IIRC the GMC came out on top.
Two years in - the Jimmy is beating my estimations.
---AND THIS was before dudes pretending to be girls were burning Teslas in effigy and driving the cost of insurance even further up.
Poor people - meaning POOR people, drive cheap cars - and those that can get smaller and more fuel efficient ones generally look for nearly clapped out non-hybrid imports that some graduate student is trading in for their first 'adult car.'

There are, probably 100 "hybrid premium' threads in this forum, and not much has changed with the math - ESPECIALLY when gas is persistently hovering around $2.50 a gallon in some parts of the US.

 

Under what conditions would you switch to a hybrid?
Would it depend on your income level or something else?

 

Well, $2.50 per gallon is definitely not the price of fuel here and not the average fuel price. Poor people also don't usually have their own businesses.

To me, a poor person's car would be something like a used Honda Fit or Nissan Versa which are being killed off just like small pickups were killed off. The poor person's car is disappearing. I guess the poor person's only hope is that the "drill baby drill" theory is enough to keep fuel costs down, perhaps closer to $2.50 or cheaper country-wide. That way they can afford to drive around their "cheap," gargantuan SUVs and pickups

My budget for my next car is $5,000 and it has to get 35mpg minimum. I'm not sure if I'll be able to get one. Hopefully this car I have lasts forever.

 

Great question!
If my income level were higher I would totally consider one, BUT it would not be a wireless hybrid, and if I could wait a year or two it would be something in a cheap domestic non-wireless pickup....but not a BEV.
When you live where the weather can kill you, and you get to choose - a BEV is less than optimum and they're still too expensive anyway unless you want a compact/subcompact car.
The recent Tesla asinine activism hasn't reached my part of the country as of this writing, but insurance costs, already fairly high, will probably go higher.
My next-door neighbor has a Cyber truck, and it had fairly long legs and they ARE rugged - but you cannot take 10 gallons of electricity with you after they set contra-flow, and loooooooong traffic jams are something you have to plan for 'left of bang.'
$80,000 buys better stuff, IMHO.

Jeep makes a PHEV....actual JEEP, but it's experiencing teething problems.
Mazda makes an OUTSTANDING PHEV in two flavors.
Yota's RAV-4 offers near adult EV range in a nowhere near-adult size car.

If money were not a factor I would have several cars because......I like 'em!
I would have at least one BEV because I can use the larger battery as a spit can for solar panels and an aux power supply for the house.
I would have a mid-size PHEV (Mazda CX 90) for my CFO.
Being a male, and with the corresponding lack of sense I would probably also have something with a soft top and large tires - several of which are also available as 'compliance plug-ins.'

FOR right now BEV/PHEVs are just not cost effective in my economic depth band.
Wireless hybrids aren't even close for me with my driving habits and location.

Just because you 'can buy a thing' does not mean you SHOULD buy a thing.

 

Is that your all time average or just a one time drive? In my hybrids I've gotten over 90mpg in one time drives including ones that are dozens of miles long (it's called hypermiling).

What kind of old pickup gets 20mpg average?

 

Going with this side bar...buy what you want and can afford...and show the same respect for others that do the same...even if what they want and can afford is different.

On thread topic...speed ticket or murder...same bad, same punishment. How much money you have in the bank has nothing to do with breaking the rules.

 

I'm not sure I've heard of any place on earth that approaches their deterrence problem quite as simplistically as that.

If there were any such place, I guess it would be fair to compare their outcomes with other places.

 

So...do you think that one's income level should determine their fine for traffic violations...or their punishment for murder?

 

That's fine. Just don't insinuate that I and others like me must be rich because we drive old Toyota hybrids and not old pickups.

There are poor that drive small cars, even hybrids. There are poor that drive pickups. I think that's right and fair to say.

True. But speeding fines have nothing to do with speeding. It's like having high cholesterol and being told to make some origami swans. How does a speeding fine stop speeding? It doesn't really.

By putting a price on speeding you're just saying that the richer you are the more you can afford to speed. Which is fine, I'm not saying that people should be shot for speeding. And really that goes for all fines. If it's a fine it's just a price, plain and simple. If you can afford it, you can do it. Only the offender can decide if it's worth his money or not.

The license point system makes more sense. You keep driving like a maniac you lose your points and you lose your driving privilege. At least that is, at least in theory, charged the same regardless of whether you're rich or poor.

I guess personally I'm quite sick being told every single day this "everyone should be charged exactly the same" philosophy. I don't care what others do or what I'm charged or what they charge others. But, for an example, people at work are constantly telling me about how unfair it is that there is some government funded affordable housing in the area. They say all housing should be available to anyone and everyone all at the same price regardless of income. Well, I guess I'll go pack my bags and move onto the streets. My full time job doesn't allow me to afford anything at market rate, so I guess what's fair is fair. They all got houses before the housing market jumped up leaps and bounds. I didn't, but who cares, fair is fair.

 

Do the crime, do the time. One's individuality or propensity in life has nothing to do with that.

 

Mods be advised...it double post error day again.