Reflections on a speeding ticket

[faendryl]

Speeding tickets assign larger-than-"just" penalties to individual instances of speeding at least partially in order to serve as deterrence. So I say we should privatize the highways and then institute a system where speeding is allowed but results in payment of a risk premium. Or perhaps something finer-grained and less heuristic would be

Comments

[flashfeather]

The Man is watching you.

[faendryl]

That's awesome - I didn't see the picture link in the notification email.

[holmes_iv]

Oh, come on-we've institutionalized gambling for the benefit of the schools, why not have negative-stakes gambling for the benefit of the highway patrol? Besides, it's a beautiful lesson in applied deterrence. (Not that I've ever paid a ginormous speeding ticket. Not me...)

[faendryl]

I'm QUITE aware of its effectiveness in deterrence, or at least in focusing attention. I sublimate irritation into philosophy.

[r_ness]

Moreover, going to traffic court to appeal is a positive-stakes gambling system. So you get even more gambling for the same activity! :)

(It's also almost always a winning bet; even you only get the points waived, you gain enough from not taking the insurance hit over the next several years that you could take an unpaid day off from work and still be ahead of the game.)

[r_ness]

Speeding tickets assign larger-than-"just" penalties to individual instances of speeding at least partially in order to serve as deterrence.

At least partially, the penalties are high because the system rewards appeal by reducing the penalty.

I think overall in the last few years, I've paid less than 50% of the nominal fines assessed on the ticket. I contest nearly* every ticket, and have in most cases had my fines reduced. In some cases, the fines have been waived entirely.

Moreover, by appealing, I have thus far in every case had the point penalty waived, which has preserved my insurance discounts.

*I paid my last ticket, for 65 km/h in a 50 km/h zone, on the theory that buying a round-trip ticket back to New Zealand in order to contest a NZ$80 ticket was not cost-effective. Also, it was also clear that the NZ authorities weren't going to report the ticket back to the States. (Otherwise, it might have ended up being worth the cost...maybe.)