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To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

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Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#101
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing how nosey Utah is. They want to scan your DL to find out who's buying alcohol, they're demanding id based age verification for watching porn online, and apparently they want to enforce monitoring on your phone+car.

As an outsider my impression of Utah it is just a state run by a religious niche group.

You're not wrong.

The state itself is at least half Mormon. When you get out of Salt Lake and Ogden, it's a lot more. But there's a lot of scenery and skiing and outdoors things to do. There's a lot of things right with the state. (Start with cities that are safer than expected for their size. Mormons have something to do with that, too.)

But in terms of how the state is run... yeah, you're not wrong.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#102

This is one of the least bad invasions of privacy I've seen. It shifts the burden of insurance premiums more towards those likely to cause accidents, and incentivizes people to minimize dangerous behavior behind the wheel. There are actual benefits to responsible people, and to society at large, which is not something you frequently see with invasion of privacy.

The problem is that the data is interpreted without context. At worst, it incentivizes bad behaviour.

The box knows I slammed on the brakes. Does it know the schmuck in the next lane dove in front of me?

If the user figures out the way to minimize beeping/penalties is to drive 45 in a 50 zone, does he now become a hazard for other drivers?

Will fender-benders go up because drivers have been disincentivized against hard stops to the point where they risk tighter and tighter spacing and go too far?

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#103
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Diesel is already taxed at a higher rate than gasoline.

A diesel truck that has three times the pressure on the road and easily ten to fifteen times the total weight, while getting about 1/3rd the gas mileage of the average US passenger vehicle. Given the (unsupported) claim that a EV wears the road significantly more than a gasoline car for what amounts to shouldn't we expect that a vehicle exerting three times the pressure on the road should pay more per mile than 'just…

> Given the (unsupported) claim that a EV wears the road significantly more than a gasoline car

Wear on the road is a function of weight. It’s really simple and uncontroversial. An EV generally weighs more than an ICE of equivalent size.

Hopefully, the federal push to install tons of charging stations will usher in useful EVs with smaller batteries, lowering weight.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#104
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Diesel is already taxed at a higher rate than gasoline.

A diesel truck that has three times the pressure on the road and easily ten to fifteen times the total weight, while getting about 1/3rd the gas mileage of the average US passenger vehicle. Given the (unsupported) claim that a EV wears the road significantly more than a gasoline car for what amounts to shouldn't we expect that a vehicle exerting three times the pressure on the road should pay more per mile than 'just…

> Given the (unsupported) claim that a EV wears the road significantly more than a gasoline car

This is an unambiguously, heavily supported claim. By states, car makers, the federal government, and third party analysis firms. It's incredibly uncontroversial. It's even got a name, and associated math: it's called the Fourth Power Law https://www.insidescience.org/news/how-much-damage-do-heavy-...

> shouldn't we expect that a vehicle exerting three times the pressure on the road should pay more per mile than 'just' 3x what you and I do in our gas passenger cars

Gas taxes make up a relatively small part of the cost of gas. If you run the numbers, you'll find that it's maybe closer to around 3.5-4x for most passenger EVs. At scale, that becomes a problem, but at the individual level, it's still a relatively small amount - and certainly less than the cost of gas.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#105
post #2

It feels to me more and more like you need to be rich to afford living without bartering away your personal information. I'm getting to be middle aged now, and have noticed a fatalistic attitude towards this by gen Z; kind of "it's impossible to maintain privacy, so I might as well milk my loss of privacy for all it's worth." And I'm wondering now if that's not completely correct.

It's true, and it's not great, but I think the flip side of this is that as I get older I find myself increasingly paying for the anti-social behavior of others. There are lot of nice customer service things that are only possible if people don't abuse them: solid warranty/return programs, high quality phone reps, etc. But you need people who adhere to the social contract, the kind of people who don't, say, buy a $3,…

Like a social credit score!

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#106

It's starting to feel like Europe. In Belgium you couldn't drive a miles without being recorded on some ALPR camera. Speed cameras everywhere. And the current rage is average speed cameras. So they take your photo on an on-ramp and when you take the exit they'll calculate the average. Above the speed limit: ticket. With no way of facing your accuser in court. The machine said so...

I've heard about that for tunnels. Do you have a source for three on-ramp/off-ramp version?

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#107
post #76

hypothetically it’s pretty easy to fake the odb reader versions of these. Just buy a male to 2 female odb splitter, strip one and hook a 9 volt battery and usb charger to the power wires. Plug your device into your car and turn it on, wait for device to blink green, attach 9 volt and unplug, carry inside and plug in usb charger to the wall.

Might want to rethink posting about committing insurance fraud.

They said "hypothetically" so they're good /s

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#109
post #81
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seattle suburbs here. I pay about $500 a year to register my (gas) car so someday I can ride the train they broke ground on 25 years ago.

Wow. I'm on the other side of Puget Sound from Seattle, over in Kitsap county, and I'm paying just under $70/year to register my car (a 2006 Honda CR-V). I knew there were extra costs in King county (and Pierce and Snohomish counties) due to a regional transit excise tax but had no idea it could raise costs that much. It looks like it is 1.1% of MSRP x depreciation, where depreciation comes from this table [1]. Ouch!…

OP's car is heavier and 10x more expensive than yours. Don't read too much into their figure. The King County RTA fee floors at $40, I think, which is what you would pay with a 2006 era vehicle. There's also a $40 Transportation Benefit District fee in the city. I suspect you would pay approximately what I do ($160/year) in the city, or less ($120/year) outside of city limits.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#110
post #82
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My gas car registration fees in Seattle are $160/year total. Of that either $80 or $120 is flat by weight and the remainder scales by value. If your fees are $500/year, your vehicle is extremely heavy, expensive, or both.

It's a newish BMW SUV, so both.

Sounds to me like the system is working exactly as it should.
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