Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees • Hacker News Board

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#111

Post by wil421 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:26 PM UTC

siruncledrew wrote: post #108

wil421 wrote: post #5

In Georgia you can see the path I-75 and I-16 take through the southern half of the state. 16 is notorious for speed traps and other shadier stuff. Including road blocks on exit ramps with drug dogs waiting to sniff cars. They bait people into getting off at the exits by leaving fake signs about upcoming road blocks. When College kids were moving or getting out of school they’d be out in full force. Sadly my Dad grew…

Basically: - Town is poor and economically desolate. - Town gets money from being legally petty to try to stay afloat. - Everyone who gets fines hates Town; wants to avoid it. - Town is poor and economically desolate. Not a prime long-term strategy. If the Town is already on life-support, then short-sightedness is their de facto choice if the Town going belly-up is their other option.

Yea if you think like a rational person. They don’t care what happens after they leave only the appearance of things while they are in office.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#112

Post by lkschubert8 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:27 PM UTC

appleiigs wrote: post #91

throwaway5752 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it isn't. Handing a $100 fine to person X and person Y is ridiculous when person X makes minimal wage and person Y is a C level executive making $400K. Normalizing the fine to the median income and proportionate changing it by income level is equitable and fair. You can look for legal precedence in bail hearings, where wealth and flight risk are definitely and correctly taken into account.

Discriminating against race, age, gender is bad. You need to treat people fairly. However, when it comes to rich people you think it's OK?

Race, age and gender are features of a person so I don't think they are all that analogous to wealth/income which is just something said person has.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#113

Post by CapricornNoble » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:28 PM UTC

distances wrote: post #84

not_a_cop75 wrote: post #21

Hell, I'd say that any town that leverages against the economically poor to benefit the economically elite is bad, and just going by the way fines are handed out, that happens everywhere. Only a handful of countries fine you by according to how much you make. While doing this can add an extra incentive for the rich to be dishonest (which happens anyway), by not doing it you are essentially telling the rich that they…

I'm from a country with so-called day fines: a fine is a multiplier of your daily earnings. It boggles my mind that a similar system isn't in use everywhere. It's easy to understand and fair to everyone; a deterrent against infractions independent of your income.

Yet another reason for the wealthy to obfuscate their earnings.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#114

Post by wil421 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:31 PM UTC

bigred100 wrote: post #72

wil421 wrote: post #5

In Georgia you can see the path I-75 and I-16 take through the southern half of the state. 16 is notorious for speed traps and other shadier stuff. Including road blocks on exit ramps with drug dogs waiting to sniff cars. They bait people into getting off at the exits by leaving fake signs about upcoming road blocks. When College kids were moving or getting out of school they’d be out in full force. Sadly my Dad grew…

I wonder if it wouldn’t be better for such towns to die. I don’t know if there’s any reason to live in a place where you don’t really have a means to do anything productive or (apparently) provide for yourself.

In a county where 35% of households are under the poverty line you don’t really have that kind of choice.

My father was able to move because he got into Georgia Tech.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#115

Post by wil421 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:32 PM UTC

lunias wrote: post #49

wil421 wrote: post #5

In Georgia you can see the path I-75 and I-16 take through the southern half of the state. 16 is notorious for speed traps and other shadier stuff. Including road blocks on exit ramps with drug dogs waiting to sniff cars. They bait people into getting off at the exits by leaving fake signs about upcoming road blocks. When College kids were moving or getting out of school they’d be out in full force. Sadly my Dad grew…

"keep parts of the town alive" Which parts? The police force? Seems to me that if your city doesn't bring in enough tax revenue to support a police force then you'd opt to have a volunteer police force. What's the situation with fire departments in these towns?

They are likely volunteer only fire departments.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#116

Post by homonculus1 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:34 PM UTC

grecy wrote: post #106

appleiigs wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discriminating against race, age, gender is bad. You need to treat people fairly. However, when it comes to rich people you think it's OK?

We already do it with progressive taxes. Fines are just a type of tax, so why can't they be progressive too?

"We already do it" is not really an argument. Many people (rightly or wrongly) disagree with progressive taxation so it's really just an appeal to a non-existent consensus.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#117

Post by kiliantics » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:35 PM UTC

And this funding is disproportionately paid for by the poor:

https://gawker.com/ferguson-and-the-criminalization-of-ameri...

The use of bureaucracy to funnel wealth from poor to rich also operates in the same way for private institutions such as banks. Graeber goes into this modern tendency towards bureaucratic rule in detail in his book "Utopia of Rules"

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#118

Post by wil421 » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:37 PM UTC

mieseratte wrote: post #57

wil421 wrote: post #5

In Georgia you can see the path I-75 and I-16 take through the southern half of the state. 16 is notorious for speed traps and other shadier stuff. Including road blocks on exit ramps with drug dogs waiting to sniff cars. They bait people into getting off at the exits by leaving fake signs about upcoming road blocks. When College kids were moving or getting out of school they’d be out in full force. Sadly my Dad grew…

Any specific examples of this? I've been taking I-16 pretty routinely for most of my life, never heard of or ran into anything resembling a speed trap let alone bait. Admittedly, I have some friends with a story about Georgia highway patrol / local PD setting up a roadblock off an interstate exit right by a Phish concert.

Yes I went to Georgia Southern briefly and had friends who graduated from there. A couple of our fraternity bothers got busted by the road block ahead trick. Maybe it was around Dublin.

Metter was/is a speed trap but I’ve only been through once in the past 5 years. Here’s a list from the AJC[1]. I can vouch for Doraville being a trap.

[1]https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.ajc.com/news/local/traffic-...

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#119

Post by xoa » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

frittig wrote: post #98

btilly wrote: post #7

Punitive fines and fees are bad. Abuse of civil forfeiture is worse. But worse still are a minority of towns that not only are dependent on punitive fines, but that levy them in a racially biased way. See https://www.npr.org/2014/08/25/343143937/in-ferguson-court-f... for an explanation of how this helped ignite the racial tension that Ferguson had a few years ago.

> and then arresting people when they don't pay [the fine]. So what should the government do if someone doesn't pay their fine?

>So what should the government do if someone doesn't pay their fine?

Just go through the process of taking the money instead, no different then a civil party who was owed a legitimate debt? There is no reason a fine should be any different. Just go through the standard process, get a court order for lien, and then just seize the money from any bank accounts, liquid assets, salary, or property of any value the person in question has (or ever will have in the future up to the statute of limitations). In fact the only real difference is that I don't think a fine is dischargeable in bankruptcy.

But why do you think there is any need to use force against the person in question, or pay to imprison them? It's not some moral issue, it's just a matter of them legitimately owing money. So just take the money (possibly allowing the working out of a payment plan). For the vast majority of cases that's all that's needed, and the few who truly live as hermits can be written off and suffer their own effective punishment anyway.

Re: Small towns in much of the country are dependent on punitive fines and fees

#120

Post by jkrems » Tue, Aug 27, 2019, 5:40 PM UTC

appleiigs wrote: post #91

throwaway5752 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it isn't. Handing a $100 fine to person X and person Y is ridiculous when person X makes minimal wage and person Y is a C level executive making $400K. Normalizing the fine to the median income and proportionate changing it by income level is equitable and fair. You can look for legal precedence in bail hearings, where wealth and flight risk are definitely and correctly taken into account.

Discriminating against race, age, gender is bad. You need to treat people fairly. However, when it comes to rich people you think it's OK?

It isn't discrimination to treat people differently. By this logic you shouldn't have handicap parking spaces because that discriminates against people that can't use them. Making people pay the same amount of money for the same crime is discriminating against the poor because the effect on them is higher even though it was the same crime.