Is that really equalized? Poor people are much more severely impacted by a loss of their license than rich people. Outside cities, for example, your driver's license is pretty intimately connected to your livelihood. I imagine this is why so many people get busted for driving with a suspended or no license. They have to get to work reliably and at a specific time, or they don't get paid. They have to pick up and drop off their kids.

A rich man can just get a driver, take an Uber, etc., and is not likely to be fired for being late, assuming he works.

If they don't care about driving and they were being a shit driver then didn't the law also work? either they are forced to drive like less of an idiot or they don't drive... I don't really care if they get a professional driver - good, less dead people on the road.

Right, but then you're worried about getting bad drivers off the road, not proportionate impact. For a poor person, losing their license (and not continuing to drive anyway) is devastating and can mean the impossibility of keeping a job or even raising their kids.

For a rich person, it just means they can't enjoy the pleasure of driving themselves around. You were talking about equalized impact to start with, I really don't see how this is a good example.

> If they don't care about driving and they were being a shit driver

These are also pretty big assumptions. I assume because of my demographic category, the times I was driving, and my car, several years ago, I received nearly two dozen tickets in a five-year period. None of the offenses were for speeding, but for various infractions like not coming to a complete stop (I was absolutely positive in every case that I did, especially after #3 or so I got paranoid about it), failure to yield, etc.

The only reason I have a license today is because I had a professional job, which allowed me the free time to go to court every single time without losing money and fight the ticket. I won every single time. Most people don't even know you can do that, they think you have to pay the fine.

If I had lost my license, I ultimately would have lost even that job. I would have to work remotely.

> You were talking about equalized impact to start with, I really don't see how this is a good example.

I am _not_ talking about equalised impact i'm talking about equalised results... the OP was suggesting that speed tickets don't stop rich people from speeding, but if you loose your license it does - that is the purpose of these laws, not to try to figure out how much punishment to deal out in relation to your personal wealth, punishment is a means to an end, not an end in itself - the end being to stop you from doing something damaging to society, in this case endangering other people's lives.

Taking away licences is an equaliser in this respect, because being rich doesn't give you more points to spend.

Licenses are for individuals, if some rich person wants to pay some _other_ individual who can actually keep their license that is fine, the law won because a safer person is driving.

Do you have a 1 or more recommendations for how to fairly treat poor who are also crappy drivers? Poverty sucks, and I don't have any bright ideas that would keep poor+bad drivers behind the wheel.

So?

What is stopping someone who loses their license from just driving anyway? They've already shown not to give a shit, so they'll continue driving without a license.

My dad lost his license many years ago and never stopped driving. He gets arrested once in a while, doesn't stop him.

> My dad lost his license many years ago and never stopped driving. He gets arrested once in a while, doesn't stop him.

You live in a very strange country, in the UK your dad would have had his car taken away from him and crushed... and if he repeatedly found other cars to drive without a license he would probably end up in prison.

My dad has been to jail before for driving without a license, but driving without a license is not a life sentence so he's back out on the road driving next month.

There is no repeat offenders law?

Really? They take your car and then crush it?

There's probably some youtube video of it. Here's an article from 2011 about uninsured vehicles: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/8247837/Cars-to-be...

I don't know how many they actually crushed, but it was some.

That’s odd. Here driving without a licence is a crime and will land you in prison for sure if caught. Why would you have a licence if there are no consequences for not having it?

There are certainly consequences, but my point was some people have established they don't care about consequences.

My dad has gone to jail for driving without a license before, but he'll go out driving when he gets out of jail. But usually his lawyer finds some sort of technically that gets him out of major trouble. I don't know the exact details, I try to ignore him as much as possible.

Then your father is a selfish individual. If he isn't licensed then he isn't insured. If he caused an accident, even without causing injury or death, he could still make someone else's life incredibly difficult.

Yes, my dad is a horrible person,I thought I was extremely clear about that.

Other family members I know who have lost their license, it's stopped extractly zero people from driving. If you don't care about the other laws enough to get caught breaking them enough to lose your license you don't care about breaking "no driving without a license" law.

Not sure in which country you live. Since the GP talks about the UK, It is good to remid that in the EU/EFTA victims of traffic accident are always entitled to compensation from a state fund, even if the driver or the vehicle is uninsured.

In the US many people purchase uninsured/underinsured motorist policies to protect themselves.

Yes but you know who pays that for fund? Everyone who pays for insurance.

Yes. It makes sense to share the burden among all drivers, instead of letting a few unfortunate people go bankrupt because of irresponsibility of others.

Around here in this part of Scotland it is mostly average speed cameras - I am amazed at the number of people who don't seem to have grasped what this means and slow down at the cameras (which are very visible) only to speed up afterwards.

We have some of those down here too but not many, they do make more sense - I see the same thing though, people slowing down and speeding up after the cameras, i think they just don't read - their loss.

In the US it depends on the state. Most states have a point system like you describe, except some states don’t (Hawaii, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, and Wyoming don’t).