It would be nice to imagine that earnings track linearly with hard work or intelligence, but the simple fact is that they don’t.

You can’t charge people more money for the same offense, way too socialistic and punishing more those that are successful in life arbitrarily more than those who are less succesful for the SAME crime!

But I know that misses the point of the article. Based on the fact that the ticket is supposed to be a punishment, then no, the regular fine probably didn’t seem that bad to this guy, although, I would be in favor of charging him the usual fine, because he would be more likely to speed again and again, which would only result in a suspended license or some other type of detriment.

I do like the creative sentencing that the judge came up with though.

The actual saying is:

Don’t do the crime, if you can’t do the TIME.

Society allowing you to pay a fine to stay out of jail, should be based on each individual persons worth for _their_ time to determine the appropriate amount for the fine. A fine that is the equivalent of 3 seconds for Bill Gates, is not fair for someone that would take 3 days of pay.

#35 said:) “…Insanity any way you look at it – the punishment should fit the crime, not the criminal…”

No, not in the US. Have you heard of the “3-strikes your out” law? A third offense could get you 20 years in prison for stealing a pack of chewing gum. Also, judges have huge leeway in prison sentencing for similar crimes specifically because of the context of how/when the crime is committed. For example, a woman killing an abusive husband is normally sentenced to far less time (if any at all), than if the roles were reversed.

The judicial branch of our government is the only branch with any common sense left, except when it comes to traffic courts…

The ‘hard-working’ lumber jack / mill worker is docked two or more days pay for the same infraction that the doctor pays off with less than 15 minutes of work.

How about we do away with fines altogether and just sentence everyone to the exact same number of hours of community service. The punishment should be based on ‘time’, not a flat dollar amount for it to be ‘fair’ across all economic levels. Do you agree that ‘time’ is the only equalizer? If you do, then it is easy to see that fines based on ‘days pay’ make sense. If you don’t think that ‘time’ is the equalizer, then see my post #24.

#44) good point, hadn’t thought of it that way. I’m sure that could be argued in court. The day-fine should be based on 8-hours of work. Just because someone works 16-hours a day (very hard worker indeed), they shouldn’t be punished twice as bad.

Speeding makes the streets less safe for pedestrians. In my neighborhood we have a highway that becomes a city street, and is a major commuting road. It is dangerous to cross for several hours of every day, and because of that the city and private schools have decided it’s not safe for kids to walk to school. So the lawless drivers – not just speeders but those who run red lights and make otherwise-legal turns when there are pedestrians in the crosswalk – raise busing costs for everyone in the city and lower livability for all of us.

You have to consider what it cost people to earn the salary that they make. most top income producing families were not just handed high paying jobs. They invested huge sums of time and money in order to increase their education and advance their career.

Truth be told, speeding in and of itself is not really a harmful activity – It harms nobody.

The harm is done when an accident occurs – and we already have laws on the books to protect people in the event that property damage occurs and/or bodily injury occurs.

In fact, when an accident occurs, speeding is USUALLY not the primary cause. Instead, inexperience, bad weather and road conditions, inattentive driving, etc are.

As for property taxes, they are linked to the houses appraisal value, as they should be.

Maybe not — if the top 5% of wage earners are earning 60% of the wages (and only paying 50% of the taxes), then they are _not_ paying enough. The extra 10% of the tax burden would be falling unfairly onto the lower 95% of the population.

Would it fair for the group who earns 60% of the wages to only pay 50% of the taxes? — conversely, being fair for the group who earns 40% of the wages to also pay 50% of the taxes? I think not.

Perhaps the unemployed should serve be incarcerated for longer terms because they have the time to spare. Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it?

People will inevitably start see dollar signs in their eyes, whether by choice or by pressure, not public safety. Okay, fine maybe they’ll pull over a 15-year-old beater if they’re REALLY speeding. But how often?

Doesn’t anyone else see a BIG problem with that?

Insanity any way you look at it – the punishment should fit the crime, not the criminal

However for repeat offenders of that nature the penalty should be MUCH more important – like loss of license

In as few words as I can manage, yes!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.....ion_Clause

but as others said… why should the police know your income?

If the possibility of paying a six-figure ticket is enough reason for you to stop striving to be the best, then you really need to do something about that.

The day rule seems to strike the best balance between the two, punitive without being egregiously so.

As I type this comment, I have decided this: breaking the law is breaking the law. If you can’t afford the fine, don’t break the law. Just because someone has more money doesn’t mean they need to pay more than someone else. It reeks of government corruption and pocket lining.

If the joker in the article with $20million networth only had to pay a $250 ticket (instead of $290,000) do you think there is any deterring for the crime with that fee?

A $250 ticket to him is equivalent to a $1.25 ticket to someone with a networth of $100k — think about it.

Fair punishment is a punishment that impacts all guilty parties the exact same way, regardless of economic status. And the best ways to do that is making the fine a percentage of income (or networth), or serve an equal number of days in jail.

John DeFlumeri Jr

Though this may lead police to target wealthier areas, or only pull over expensive cars…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day-fine

“A day-fine or day fine or unit fine is a unit of fine payment that, above a minimum fine, is based on the offender’s daily personal income. A crime is punished with incarceration for a determined number of days, or with fines. As incarceration is a financial punishment, in the effect of preventing work, a day-fine represents one day incarcerated and without salary. It is argued to be just, because if both the high-, and low-income population are punished with the same jail time, they should also be punished with a proportionally similar income loss. An analogy may be drawn with income tax, which is also proportional to the income, even progressively.

Jurisdictions employing the day-fine include Finland (Finnish: päiväsakko), Sweden (Swedish: dagsbot), Denmark, Germany, Mexico, and Macao.”

I betcha it’s not the same amount…

Interest rates on your mortgage, auto loan, credit card, etc should be based on your daily pay ? Slippery slope isnt it ??

Easier to calculate, and really stresses the ‘time’ part of the punishment.

What shouldn’t be allowed is for the discretion of the fine to be at the patrolman level. First, it could easily be a target for fraud (“I can give you this $10k speeding ticket, or you can write me a check for $2k”). Second, does this mean I now have to carry a copy of my tax return in my car? Third, if my income is below a certain level, does this mean I face little to no repercussions for speeding?

It’s a poor idea to set fines at income levels, the government cannot act in an arbitrary and capricious manner. A system where you must face a judge for extreme cases is the best way.

No, because we all have about the same amount of time in our lives. You can’t increase it, no matter how rich you may be.

But money is different. For example, it is not worth Bill Gate’s ‘time’ to even bend over to pick up a $100 bill. He makes vastly more than that in the time it would take for him to bend over. Whereas, a poor person might not make $100 in an entire day.

A flat-rate fine of $250 is not even 3 seconds for Bill Gates, but could be 2 1/2 days for a poorer sap.

That is why indexing fines to wealth is the only fair punishment — or putting them into jail for the exact same number of hours/days…

At least here in the states it is normally written into the traffic laws that a violation is punishable by a fine and/or jail. If the issue is rich people ignoring speed limits multiple times because the financial penalty doesn’t hurt them, use the jail time instead. Some spolied rich kid may not care about a $200 traffic fine, but he’ll certainly get upset about being thrown in the pokey for a few days. See Paris Hilton for an example of this in action.

I happen to not agree that fines should be indexed to wealth. Why should I be punished because I manage my money effectively. A high salary individual with a low net worth would pay a smaller fine than a person who has a low salary but has saved. I think not.

But the higher fine is more of a win-win.

Speeding tickets are a form of punishment(obviously) but because we all have different ways of making a living there is a very wide margin of incomes. So then that $250 fine becomes an obstacle that makes the poor guy lose sleep over compared to the wealthy person who can pay for it without breaking a sweat. It’s no longer a punishment for them..

But is it worth the hassle? The process of gathering the incomes and net worth of all drivers and calculating how much their speeding ticket should be?
Maybe and I like the idea but I don’t think it is.

In the case of this speeder (who payed the $290k fine), that equates to 1.45% of his networth — which I think is pretty harsh — but I bet no-one (rich or poor) would speed if it cost them 1.45% of their networth if caught.

The effect of speeding is the same regardless whether someone is wealthy or not. Speeding fines should only be based on speed and frequency of law breaking, nothing else. If poor people can’t afford the fine, don’t speed, don’t break the law.

So if your worried about time, going the speed limit would get you there faster than getting a ticket. That is assuming you are caught of course.

It does seem fair at first glance to charge wealthy people more money, but to weed out the ones who are taking advantage of being wealthy, there should be stiffer penalties for repeat offenders instead of just high initial fines.

I do think rich people should pay more for speeding tickets. Not cause its ‘fair’ or to get more of their money but because the speeding ticket is supposed to keep them from speeding. Paying a $200 fine is hardly a disincentive for a very wealthy person. If I’m poor then I won’t speed cause I don’t want to lose the money. That $200 matters to a low income person. So the fine itself acts as a disincentive to keep low income people from speeding. But if you’re mega rich then you really don’t care about that $200. I’m sure Paris Hilton or someone like that is a conscious scoff law for motor vehicle laws simply because the punishment of speeding fines is meaningless to them. A smart businesswoman who makes a ton of money might do the math and decide that speeding 20MPH over the limit makes good financial sense to her because her time is worth more than the speeding fines.

So for speeding tickets to be effective with the rich they need to be paying more. Otherwise the small fine is meaningless and the punishment is impotent.