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Comment by D_Guidi | Hacker News Reader

the poor simply can respect the rules like the rich, right?

I mean, if the speed limit says 50km/h, then you should be doing 50km/h, regardless of the size of your bank account. If someone hits a pedestrian and kills them because they were doing twice the speed limit, "yeah but I'm poor" is not a valid defence.

That's not the point. It costs a poor person more to speed because they have less money. Conversely it costs a rich person less to speed.

The issue is easily solved by making the fine proportional to your income, as it already is in many European countries. And then the penalty points hurt equally because you will lose your licence regardless of how rich your are once you get enough points.

The revoking of a license also hurts poor people improportionally more. If you depend on your car and need it to get to your job, loosing the ability to drive will: A) make you loose your job B) go in debt to solve your mobility problem C) make you do stupid things like driving without license D) maybe you are lucky and there is cheap public transport or it is close enough for cycling

For a rich person A to C are usually not a problem. Just take a taxi.

But if someone is putting others at danger, they shouldn't be treated with mercy just because they are poor. If you drive dangerously why does it matter that you need your car to feed your family? It doesn't and it shouldn't.

Yes the consequences are worse for a poor person, but that's like saying that consequences of murder are worse for a poor person - if they go to prison then their family is now at risk because maybe they were the only money making person in the family. Rich person's family is probably going to be fine. But does that mean that poor people should be punished less for murder? Of course this is hyperbole now, but I think the same principle applies.

But why should the poor be punished more than the rich? If you do that too much the poor put on yellow vests and start breaking things. It’s kind of a French tradition. At least this time they aren’t building guillotines.

>>But why should the poor be punished more than the rich?

I just disagree with this sentence, vehemently. If someone is driving a car in a dangerous manner, they should lose the right to drive regardless of how much they need it, and definitely regardless of how rich/poor they are. What's the appropriate punishment for a poor person in your opinion?

Like, I genuinely don't understand? A "rich" person should lose their licence for 12 months, but a poor person should only get away with a warning because they need a car to make money?

So if the very next day they get behind the wheel and kill someone, the court process will look like this

"Dear Honour, the accused was stopped for dangerous driving yesterday"

"ok, why were they still driving today then?"

"They are poor, so they were allowed to keep the licence"

Like, that's literal insanity. Driving is a right, not a privilege. If getting too many points means you can't get to your job and lose said job - I'm really sorry, but that's tough shit. I'd rather they didn't have a job than continue driving and be a danger to others.

Nobody is arguing that a poor person should be punished less severely for breaking the law.

Instead, the point I am trying to get across is how it feels to be a poor person that receives a more painful punishment relative to a privileged class and the kind of sentiment that would breed among the poorer class.

I am not French so I will not presume to know what the purpose of the Yellow Vest movement really is but it sounds to me like there are economically disadvantaged classes that are tired of being left out in the cold.

This is a matter of empathy, not lawmaking.

Nice idea in theory, but the fines aren't proportional to your income and in a lot of places people will point out the speed cameras are in a poor area - so whilst theoretically a rich person speeding would be fined too, they'll just never go past the camera.

They are in some countries, which I linked an article about.

Sweden and Finland have fines based on the annual income.[0]

[0]: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-31709454

In Switzerland as well but only for highway with more then 25 Km/h over. [1]

[1] https://rp-online.de/panorama/ausland/raser-drohen-782000-eu...

You're probably thinking Switzerland, not Sweden. I've been living in Sweden for quite a while, never heard of fines based on income levels.

https://www.sueddeutsche.de/auto/rekord-bussgeld-euro-strafe...

You are correct on Finland, you are wrong on Sweden. In fact, Sweden is not even mentioned in your source so not sure where you got it from.

Memory, which might have been failing me as well... The source was just an example

Imagine if they caught Jeff Bezos. They could probably fund their entire police force for several years.

https://www.businessinsider.com/what-amazon-ceo-jeff-bezos-m...

The nokia boss had to pay 116 000 EUR in 2002 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1759791.stm

This is why you get a chauffeur.

That's not how regressive penalties work. Incentives are only equal if the penalty amount is based on ability to pay.

The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.

you got it wrong: the rich will pay, but that amount means nothing to them.

That's where the penalty points come in - you can't pay your way out of losing your licence once you get enough of them. The fine might be meaningless but having to stop driving for 12 months is not.

Penalty points also disproportionately affect the poor, who are more likely to depend on their driving license for their income

So what do you propose? That we punish people who put others in danger less because they are poor? Someone moving at 100km/h through a city isn't any less likely to kill someone when hit just because they are poor. They aren't any less of a danger just because they have a family that depends on them. Someone they hit won't be any less dead because the driver has 5 children and mountains of debt.

> Someone moving at 100km/h through a city isn't any less likely to kill someone when hit just because they are poor.

Actually we could argue that it's more likely due to the poor average condition and old age of their cars. A new Mercedes brakes much better than a 20 year old Skoda and usually has auto-braking systems and braking force enhancers.

However "going through a city" is very general. There are several actual highways (by law as well as by construction standards) in Prague going through the city where the speed limit (70 km/h) is frequently broken with no possible victims - the exact same road has 130 km/h limit outside the city.

That speed limit might be more noise related. So the harm is much different, but the victims are people living nearby.

Just like moving next to an airport and then complaining about the noise. Those same victims likely received a discount on property price as compensation.

Seeing as it's Prague, the chances are very good that the houses were built long before cars were a thing.

And I don't even understand your assumption - of course you should be complaining about noise levels if they are unacceptable, no matter if you just moved next to an airport or if you lived there for the past 50 years. Same as moving next to a pub or a night club - why does it matter that you just moved next to it, if the local laws governing noise levels at certain times existed for decades? Either the club/pub/airport brakes those laws or it doesn't - your personal length of habitation in the area has nothing to do with it.

Most of the roads I'm talking about are not near houses and/or underground. There are several roads where it indeed is noise related, but these ones are 60km/h only.

They will still loose points on their driving license. Everybody has the same amount (and not much).

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