> it's only "copyright infringement" if you don't have enough money for lawyers

"If the penalty for a crime is a fine, then that law only exists for the lower class."

Not of the fine is set to be a ratio or proportion of your wealth or income.

You might be getting closer but someone who is just barely making ends meet could be ruined by that, where someone with obscene wealth can lose even 10% and still buy a yacht minutes later.

In my homecountry someone gets hundreds of speeding tickets per year, always on the same road. Doesn't care. With a properly scaling fine they'll stop doing that quickly or lose out on more than just a little yacht.

I'd say it's a pretty decent step, especially when combined with confiscation of the vehicle if it's a repeat offender or a severe case. As you said it may not be perfect...but I'd rather see that than some careless people risking lives of others just because a speeding ticket is small change for them.

Hows this: get three speeding tickets, get your license suspended.

Well so what, then they'll drive without a license. As long as the punishment isn't sufficient to make the person care enough you will only nudge the threshold a bit under which people actually feel it.

Edit: Same with using the phone while driving. It's one of the biggest contributing factors to road accidents, yet here the fine for doing it is barely above the price for a decent headset. So most just don't care and trust the fact that well under 1% will ever be caught because the police either doesn't care either or just doesn't have the manpower to effectively enforce it.

In Sweden the fine is in proportion to your income. If you go too fast they take your drivers license. Repeat speeding too many times and they might also take your license.

This is just saying that rich people are rich.

Someone with obscene wealth can be imprisoned and still buy a yacht - even incarceration has a much greater impact on a poor person.

As such, I'd rather fine them in proportion to their wealth.

Why not both?

Yeah, but he can only do that a few times. It's a much, much better system than what we have today for most things.

Of course, it hinges on being able to tell how much income they have, which is (at least in Germany) the hard part, as the defendant is not required to help.

The tax authority generally has that data.

And that generally does not matter, as the DA/judge will estimate the income based on available information. They will usually _not_ involve the tax authority, won't check your bank account etc. If their estimate is too high, you can provide information showing your actual income. If it's too low (which it usually is, because they're conservative in those estimates), you smile and walk out, having saved (a lot of) money.

One could always establish a minimum-living income that was immune to fines based on ratio of income, or consider specific expenditures to be protected from the calculation (e.g. rent or cost of travel to work). However, I can see how that could eventually lead to the truism becoming "If the penalty for a crime is an income-ratio fine, then that law only exists for the middle class, and not for the lower or upper class" which would be... interesting.

When it comes to civil litigation, the poor and insolvent are already often considered judgment-proof [1]. So you could say we already have a little of that “laws exist only for the middle class” scenario.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_proof

I've often wondered whether penalties should target reputation more than they do, which would affect all classes of criminal including upper class. For example, as part of the sentence for violent crimes, the government could mail official press releases about the crime to all households in the area periodically for a certain amount of time after the conviction, or put up signs, at the criminal's expense (with a government cost-sharing for poorer criminals beyond whatever cost society would view appropriate to fine them - but mail and signage aren't that expensive). And companies convicted of a crime might have to fund government notifications of their crime to their customers and store/office visitors.

Details might need tweaking, but a version of this could really work.

I see what you are getting at. Do you think it could go a bit overboard though? That it makes people kind of take the law into their own hands?

There's a risk of that, yes. As I said, the details need tweaking. It would be especially helpful for wealthy, powerful, and/or corporate criminals who are probably paying for good private security regardless of their criminal record/sentence or lack thereof.

I do believe that the shame-feeling part of society is generally less likely to commit crimes. That is, it would work on them, but it wouldn't work on someone who does not care what their neighbors think of them.

A lot of companies and businesspeople care what their customers and the general public think, at least.

or teenagers/young adults in a rebellious state of mind. If you like to provoke and your circle of friends feels the same then you're not shamed.

Here in Denmark fines for drunk driving, driving while influenced by drugs, and driving while your license is suspended is income dependent. The exact fine is also dependent on your blood toxicity levels. And if you are under 18 or have a low income you can get half off the fine.

Devils advocate: Someone with a yatch can have someone 'who barely makes ends meet' to do the dirty work, pay the now lowered fine. Payoff the poor guy and be done with it.

Sure, but if you have nothing you can't make amends for damages either.