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Comment by bobince | Hacker News Reader

The cost of a false alarm for a smoke alarm is borne by owner of the smoke alarm. The cost of a false alarm for a car alarm is borne by everybody in earshot (typically not the owner).

The car alarm owner is forcing an externality cost onto society; there is no incentive for an individual car alarm owner to reduce false positives so it is no surprise the products are so bad.

(Even in the true-positive case, the car alarm is extracting its value from the attention of third parties to the thievery, at no cost to the owner.)

Conclusion: every sounding of a car alarm should attract a substantial tax penalty.

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> every sounding of a car alarm should attract a substantial tax penalty.

I live in a poorer west side chicago neighborhood and car alarms go off all the time. I am jolted out sleep frequently by multiple alarms going off at the same time. I never experienced this in somewhat affluent neighborhoods, I think poor ppl are more sensitive(no pun intended) to theft so they turn alarm sensitivity all the way up.

So fining would affect poorer ppl more than rich ppl and might be politically sensitive much like the chicago soda tax that was rolled back for this precise reason.

> So fining would affect poorer ppl more than rich ppl

Yeah but if you're getting woken up multiple times at night in a poor neighborhood, then it's poor people who don't own car alarms who are negatively affected the most.

If you are poor you have much higher tolerance to things like these.

If you are poor, you do not have a higher tolerance.

If you are poor, you have significantly less agency to effect change to remedy your situation - so you have no choice but to tolerate things like these.

A rich person can move, install soundproofing, afford air conditioning to sleep with the windows shut, etc...

A poor person can have interrupted sleep.

Yup, you have “higher tolerance” to things that have been continually forced on you—doesn’t mean your tolerance is actually higher, just that you’re more experienced at sucking it up.

I distinctly remember the day when I, as a young teenage boy, observed “Huh, the girls in my class are a lot better than the boys at doing work they don’t want to do. The boys complain and try to get out of it, the girls generally just do it whether they like it or not.”

Then I realised—oh, the girls feel like they’re expected to just do it. They don’t feel as entitled to a say in the matter as the boys do, because that’s how they’ve each been socialised.

And then I began seeing parallels everywhere…so that was the moment that set me on the path of social activism, really.

Higher end cars rarely have aftermarket alarms installed, alarms on lower end cars are sign for thieves, those who have them fitted are because have valuables hidding like tools or sound systems so they just kick the car a few times o throw something at it, after a few "false" alarms the pissed owner just deactivates it or puts it in silent mode. A better solution is the two-way alarm where you have a remote that will sound and vibrate and indicate the type of alarm like shock or open door/trunk there's also some that work with an app and have tracking capabilities and can send a snapshot of the interior of the vehicle or disable the ignition.

> The cost of a false alarm for a smoke alarm is borne by owner of the smoke alarm.

By the tenant, anyway. And any of the tenants' neighbors close enough to hear the shrieking.

> The car alarm owner is forcing an externality cost onto society; there is no incentive for an individual car alarm owner to reduce false positives so it is no surprise the products are so bad.

Modern smoke detectors also have extremely high false positive rates. I've lived in two buildings built after 2009 since 2013, and in both, if you so much as look sideways at a piece of toast the alarm goes off screaming "Fire!" at 120 dB. Nevermind trying to broil steak...

I read that a photoelectric smoke detector gave far fewer false positives and found that to be the case. No more alarms when boiling water or making a stir fry. This one is very affordable, if you have control over your smoke detector.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00PS6EFIE/

Do you have the product name? The link seems to be broken.

It was an X-Sense DS31, looks like it has been replaced by this one: https://smile.amazon.com/X-Sense-10-Year-Battery-Detector-Ph...

Thanks!

For burglar alarms a lot of jurisdictions require a permit. The police triage alarm calls without a human report as very low priority. Where I live alarm permits get cancelled after three false alarms.

Large commercial facilities are required to handle small emergencies themselves by noticing 911 calls coming from their lines and directing public safety personnel to the exact location, training safety & security staff on AED and fire extinguisher use, etc.

I hate car alarms too, but most people either don't know how to lock their cars without arming the alarm, or actually can't... It's hard to see how we could legislate them away locally, it'd need to be national to be feasible.

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