$40 road tolls offer insight into commuter psychology

Re:$40 road tolls offer insight into commuter psychology by maxxxxx on Thursday December 07, 2017 @04:25AM (#15868720)

Making fees and fines dependent on income is a good way to get incentives right. In Germany for example health insurance is based on your income, not a fixed amount like here.

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Re:$40 road tolls offer insight into commuter psychology by todd8 on Thursday December 07, 2017 @05:02AM (#15868861)

I believe that health care in the US is subsidized to some degree by people with higher income.

—- Medicare payroll taxes are proportional to salary.

—- Low income people that use hospitals generally don’t end up paying for their surgery and care which is passed on to people that do pay their bills.

—- Big pharma offers heavy discounts to low income patients for expensive drugs resulting in higher costs for the rest of us.

—- Under the current Afforadable Care Act free/low cost insurance is provided by raising taxes on the upper income people.

I don’t know what’s the best way to improve the system; I just wish the costs, who was paying for it, and where the money was going was more transparent. It appears that it is intentionally designed to be inscrutable.

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Re:$40 road tolls offer insight into commuter psychology by MandieD on Thursday December 07, 2017 @09:24AM (#15870160)

But only up to a certain point: the tax is only on the first 50k EUR or so of your salary, and there is a minimum charged (about 100 EUR/mo.) no matter how little you make.

Still fairer than the US, though.

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Re:$40 road tolls offer insight into commuter psychology by humanrebar on Thursday December 07, 2017 @08:04AM (#15869622)

No, they should just improve the economy and supplement income (minimum income, negative income tax) to ensure that everyone can afford the cost of living, $40 tolls included.

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