this post was submitted on 15 Feb 2024
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Of course it does. A poor person might find themselves in a situation where they have to steal groceries or other necessities for pure survival. If I were poor and needed diapers and there was no governmental support program available I would also steal them. Or formula or whatever. A rich person can afford all of that. If they steal groceries it is for the thrill, not out of necessity.
Also, note that really bad crimes (murder for example) are not fined. In that sense it does not matter what the financial status of the perpetrator is. Although filthy rich people can sometimes even buy their way out of these crimes.
You have a point but what about stuff like traffic violations? Nobody NEEDS to commit one, so should these fines be the same for everyone?
Also, following your example, person A making 75k/year and person B making 150k/year both have no necessitiy to steal groceries. Yet, if the fine was income-dependent, person B would have to pay way more.
if the goal of the fine is to deter people from committing a traffic violation, the person making $150k will not be equally deterred compared to the person making $75k. If the fine has too little impact, it no longer works as a deterrent. This is especially true for things like parking tickets, where you aren't necessarily putting yourself or others in danger like you might be for speeding (though, assuming the two people only differ in their income and all other variables -- like how willing they are to drive dangerously -- remain equal, then the point still stands).
Okay but then what about those poor people mentioned above that need to steal for necessities. Wouldn't we want to deter them the most (as they are the most likely to commit the act)?
It doesnt seem logical to me to say that we should increase the fines to deter (wealthy) people more and at the same time say that we should lower the fines so (poor) people that are currently deterred can afford to break the law (?)...
Well we went down a road that I think we need to track back.
Poor people committing "necessary" crimes is not the focus and should not be. The whole idea of necessary crimes that should not be punished is awful - we should focus on building a society where people don't end up in a position where they have to steal (etc.) to survive. If we are already thinking of how to better jurisdiction I'd argue we have space to assume we can also better their situation in general. We want to deter them from crimes the most, yes, but not by scaring them with the consequences of being caught - we want to deter them by making them unnecessary. No person should be poor, period.
I think what this comes down to is the question of fines themselves. It has almost something catholic about it. You buy yourself out of punishment. I'd argue that this concept is flawed in itself, no matter how you adjust it.
My guess is that this is what the post was supposed to say. Money in itself isn't too much of a fair concept, or a just one. But punishment, law enforcement, etc, should be, despite taking place in a capitalist society.
What it comes down to would probably be something like social service (my guess). Is the crime committed violent and does the perpetrator pose a severe security risk to society? Then a correction facility that focuses on healing, mental and physical health, rehabilitation and reintegration into society should be the choice. The crime was something that could also be fined? Cut the fine, make it a social service. Picking up trash from sideroads, cleaning public toilets. This will benefit the public/society and no one can buy their way out of it.
Well, that would just shift the problem: Now, instead of wealthy people being less deterred, it's the people with a bunch of free time that are less deterred (college kids screwing around, people with no job)...
Also, it doesnt benefit the society any more that the fine's money would (assumuning the community service would be equivalent to the current monetary value). (There are also other problems like verifying the work is actually done and also small fines, like, am I supposed to pick up trash from the sidewalk for 2 minutes for jaywalking?)
stealing != traffic violation. while stealing may have a fine associated with it, it's generally based on restitution for the goods stolen + legal fees etc. So, you're moving the goal posts on me, and my feelings about how to handle theft of necessities is tangential to the discussion (for the record, my feelings are: if you see someone stealing necessities, no you didn't).
You seem to not be getting that the goal should be equal deterrence regardless of income or wealth or whatever the most fair metric happens to be. IDK what the baseline fine should be, nor what the most fair way to scale the fines should be b/c i'm a chemist, not a sociologist or legal scholar. But at the end of the day, if the only punishment is a fine, the wealthy don't have to give a shit.
Edit: for #2, let's use time instead of money. If instead of paying a $1000 fine, you could do community service. But the "value" of your community service is tied to your wage/salary. So, someone making $10/hr has to do 100 hrs of community service, while someone else making $100/hr only has to do 10 hrs of community service. Is that still fair in your view?
Lets focus on non-necessity acts here (e. g. traffic violations).
Deterring people is not the only goal, it also needs to be fair/appropriate. And this is where, IMO, the income-adjusted fines fail.
Fines should be adjusted depending on the offense commited, possibly also taking into account the intentions. Personal wealth is not a factor that seems reasonable to me to take into account regarding the fairness.
Essentially, I believe that everybody should be treated equally before the law. Nobody should be treated better or worse (or have a better or worse punishment) just because of their social status. That's why I believe that fixed fines are fair and the suggested varying punishments are not. I do recognize that they may deter wealthier people less.
I agree that everyone should be equal under the law, but that doesn't mean that fixed fines are fair. The same amount of money has a different value to different people, and that perceived value changes depending on one's income and wealth.
IDK if you saw my edit in my previous response with the community service example, but I think that might help clear up where we're diverging. If it takes me 10 hours of work to make enough money to pay the fine, but it takes you 100 hours of work to pay the fine for the exact same offense because our salaries are different, were we really punished equally?
I guess that depends on the metric you use. You say they should be punished by time (and so people who earn money more quickly should have to pay more). However, I see many problems with that and I think it would result in much less fair fines than now.
Picture two persons, one living in the countryside, one in a big city. The second person earns considerably more than the first because life in the city is just more expensive. Both persons have the same amount of money left at the end of the month (after paying the bells etc) but income-adjusted fines would mean person B would have to pay way more.
If it's posession-bases instead (i.e. your fines depend on what you have/own) then what about some person who inherited a large house that is worth lots of money and has an otherwise normal job. This person may also have the same amount of money left at the end of the month as the other two persons but because of his big house, he'd have to pay even more, potentially sell his house because of a small offense.
Do you think that rich people should have to serve shorter prison sentences because their time is more valuable? Do you at least SEE the parallel I'm trying to draw here?
And I already admitted that I don't know what the optimal metric is. I just know that a flat fine that is the same for everyone, without taking into account their financial situation at all, is unfair.
Of course not. I completely get your point, you say (correct me if I'm wrong) that time is a fair metric for everyone. I respect that.
I agree, however I think money is too. Sure - some people have more or less money, and some people live longer or shorter lives. But everyone can still do the same in one hour and everyone can still buy the same things for 10€.
What I think is UNFAIR is trying to "convert" one metric to the other depending on personal wealth. If I get a fine, it should be a fixed amount of money IMO and if you charge me with time in some way then it should be a fixed amount of time.