Finnish justice system strikes again!

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Hurricane
At best, increased fines will increase the police budget the next year.

Yippee. New squad cars with Bose stereos around.

It seems to me this is another means of penalizing the rich simply because they are rich, or most likely targeting the rich because they are rich.

But because it is the ultimate sin to actually be wealthy I suppose all is fair no?

[Pekka]

Yes, being rich is BAD. Even though you pay more taxes, and likely are worth 100 people tax wise, it doesn't matter, you're a bastard for having a nice car, a house, and nicer things. I think we should all go to streets and take these evil money whales and take their money which they stole anyway and give it to the poor. Yes!

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Shhhh....

Pekka there are commies everywhere you know. Mustn't give them too many ideas.

[Jon Miller]

Re: Finnish justice system strikes again!

Originally posted by Pekka
This one though is not about too easy punishments, this is the other side to it, which is naturally also unfair. We just can't get anything right.

This guy was speeding, traffic violation, can you guess how much he got fined? Let me hint you, it's another world record, and to my joy it is to say we hold the other records too.

170 000 euros. YES! He has a good income, I guess he's even little rich. But hey, to get 170 000 euros just because you have good income? It makes the papers for sure, but most people are thinking 'he has the money to pay for it' and is happy about it. Jealous happiness. If you make money, you deserve to get assraped.

The way of thinking behind this is, that the punsihment should be the same for everyone, meaning if we fine the rich, it must hurt like it hurts the poor. Now that is ****ed up. Now what about killers? If you're let's say child gets murdered, you get about 3-4000 euros for pain and mental trauma (yes, that's about how much it is in courts), and another one for other inconvinience. Life costs about 10 000 euros or less in here. But if you have money and drive too fast with your nice car, hey, 170 000 is totally justified, in line with the other punishments, totally logical and yeah, I think rich people should just die so we poor folks can be happy about ourselves.

can you give links to this (like from your last statement about murder)

JOn miller

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Indeed... I mean, what are we talking here, does the court have do an audit on every speeder to see how much they can really pay?

There's something called a tax declaration.

And, of course, we will get the enforcement problems of police being told to go after speeders driving BMV's and Mercedes' because that will result in more money in the coffers of the city.

Utterly silly.

Yeah. We might as well solve the problem of the police going against ethnic minorities, without even any directive for it. Do you really think the police will let the cheap cars go?

[Imran Siddiqui]

There's something called a tax declaration.

But how do you know if they didn't lie on their taxes? We are just going to take their income tax filings as truth? What if they have a ton of money in offshore tax havens? Wouldn't laws like this just increase that?

We might as well solve the problem of the police going against ethnic minorities, without even any directive for it.

Just because there is one wrong, we should initiate another?

Do you really think the police will let the cheap cars go?

If you get much more money for every expensive care, HELL YA!

[Fake Boris]

C'mon Imran, are you having a bad time recently? Your posts have definitely been sucking more than usual in the last few days.


Why is it that the police is not all set on finding speeders? Why is it that they're spending any money on crimes with no fines as the penalty? Do you think the radar guy even has the time to notice the brand of the car? And do you think he would let go a cheap car, on the prospect he could arrest a Porsche in the meantime?- now that would be losing money.

As for the tax declaration, yes, it's a problem. High taxes yield greater evasion. Then so what? We can't catch all criminals, and we can't assume a tax declaration to be false in the beginning.

Wasn't it you who said that ALL laws should be enforced? So well, enforce the tax laws enough that people will fear evading it.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Why is it that the police is not all set on finding speeders? Why is it that they're spending any money on crimes with no fines as the penalty? Do you think the radar guy even has the time to notice the brand of the car? And do you think he would let go a cheap car, on the prospect he could arrest a Porsche in the meantime?- now that would be losing money.

The police usually do NOT stop you for going 10 miles over the speed limit, because the fines are too miniscule to waste their time.

And yes I said they'd let go a cheap car because they want to wait for a Porsche... . Chances are the cheap car isn't the only one speeding (unless you drive on wierd roads where only one car speeds) and the cops, instead of going after the cheap car going 20 miles over the speed limit, will instead go for the 10 mph over the limit rich car.

So well, enforce the tax laws enough that people will fear evading it.

Tax shelters are NOT illegal! There is a reason they are refered to as 'loopholes'.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Spiffor

This is probably a better idea than a fine anyway. But if your country insists on deterring crime with fines, they should indeed be as much of a pain for the rich as for the poor. Otherwise, the fines would be "just another little fee to pay" for the rich to have a dangerous behaviour.

Yeah, but should a person EVER have to pay more for a SPEEDING ticket than even one person has to for rape or murder?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by The Templar


Agreed. Look at the question another way. Why should a poor person have to pay .1% of their yearly income while the rich pay .0000001% of their income on the same offense. The rich and the poor should be treated equally under the law.

Why should you be measuring in percent of income anyways? "Equally" would mean they pay exactly the same amount - last time I checked, 170,000 != 160

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by The Templar


It is the same punishment - i.e. x percent of your income. How is fining the exact same percentage not the same punishment?

How about this, then - let's make the fine proportional to the INVERSE of your income? A flat percent is proportional to your income, a progressive tax is proportional to the square of your income, why can't I have something proportional to my income to the -1?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger




You know what's worse? Tobacco. In the US, tobacco-related deaths is about 10 times that of deaths caused by car accidents.

I take it you also support the "war on drugs" then... because the reason tobacco causes more deaths is because it's USED more.

EDIT: than other drugs

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by skywalker
Yeah, but should a person EVER have to pay more for a SPEEDING ticket than even one person has to for rape or murder?

I don't think rape of murder should be punished by fines actually. Prison, reeducation and psychological treatment are much better IMHO.

But if rape or murder are fined, I'd indeed feel very awkward if the maximal fine for speeding (the maximal % of your income) ever excesses the minimal fine for raping or murdering (the minimal % of your income)

[Kuciwalker]

I mean the actual number - if anyone ever has to pay, say, 100,000 euros for a crime like that, no one should pay over 100,000 for speeding. It's a travesty.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by skywalker
I mean the actual number - if anyone ever has to pay, say, 100,000 euros for a crime like that, no one should pay over 100,000 for speeding. It's a travesty.

Not if you change your frame of reference, and think purely in terms of % of income instead of hard numbers.