The true cost of a speeding ticket.....

[Klackamas]

http://blogs.forbes.com/moneybuilder/2011/06/02/the-true-cost-of-a-speeding-ticket/

[Rupert]

Um, yes, we all know that car insurance costs more for people with tickets.

[James Young]

For the million tickets written by the Texas DPS during one year, speeding outnumbered all others combined by more than two to one.  Yet, there is no correlation between speed limits, actual driving speeds or the level of enforcement and the three critical measures of traffic safety.
   
Once again, has the law no honor at all?

[S204STi]

More like, do insurance companies have any honor at all? 

[Eye of the Tiger]

Insurance companies give cops free radar guns, or so I hear.

[James Young]

There is a convergence of interest between law enforcement, the jurisdictions and the insurance industry.  They work together, money goes from the public to jurisdictions and the insurance industry, and it's all based on a lie.

[bing_oh]

Insurance companies give cops free radar guns, or so I hear.

Could you tell me which ones do that? The radar in my cruiser is horribly out of date and I'd really like a new one but our bidget is stretched thin as it is right now. BTW, just in case you didn't catch it, that was my way of saying that I've never heard of such a thing in my 11 years in LE.

[James Young]

GEICO has been doing this for over 40 years.
 
You don't need radar to detect impeding.  Just sayin'

[Klackamas]

Could you tell me which ones do that? The radar in my cruiser is horribly out of date and I'd really like a new one but our bidget is stretched thin as it is right now. BTW, just in case you didn't catch it, that was my way of saying that I've never heard of such a thing in my 11 years in LE.

Out of date? Stop using the damn thing. It's like sitting on a microwave oven.

[Byteme]

Could you tell me which ones do that? The radar in my cruiser is horribly out of date and I'd really like a new one but our bidget is stretched thin as it is right now. BTW, just in case you didn't catch it, that was my way of saying that I've never heard of such a thing in my 11 years in LE.

See Last paragraph of:   http://www.michiganpoliceequipment.com/policeradarguns.html

Google ::  Insurance company buying police radar guns and you see a ton of discussion about it. 

[bing_oh]

See Last paragraph of:   http://www.michiganpoliceequipment.com/policeradarguns.html

Google ::  Insurance company buying police radar guns and you see a ton of discussion about it.

I googled just what you said and have yet to find a reputable source that says that insurance companies have actually donated radar or laser units to police departments. I see a bunch of message board comments and "I heard" posts, but nothing beyond that. The Michigan Police Equipment site doesn't help either...a business that claims it is no more reputable than a person who claims it without some kind of support for those claims.

I can google "Area 51 aliens" and get a bunch of internet discussion on that, too. My point being, internet discussion does not make it the truth. Maye it is true, but I've never heard of it (and I have perhaps the cheapest chief on the face of the planet, so I'd think he'd be all over it if an insurance company was giving away free radar units. Hell, he'd probably be all over if if they were giving away free fridge magnets!).

[James Young]

GEICO used to make PSAs (public service announcements) touting their "contribution to safety" by donating radar units to law enforcement.  They, of course, never said that they also made millions off of these donations.  Now, they have made no such announcements of which I am aware, probably because the tide of public opinion has shifted against speed control.

[hounddog]

See Last paragraph of:   http://www.michiganpoliceequipment.com/policeradarguns.html

Google ::  Insurance company buying police radar guns and you see a ton of discussion about it. 

"Now serving the general public of all 50 states."   

Pretty much derails any credibility they have on this topic since it is in their best interest to put forth such statements in attempt to peddle their wares.

[hounddog]

GEICO

You mean, Warren "I will do anything to make a dollar so that I might donate it to every liberal and anti-government cause I can find" Buffett?

Yeah, great example. 

There is a convergence of interest between law enforcement, the jurisdictions and the insurance industry.  They work together, money goes from the public to jurisdictions and the insurance industry, and it's all based on a lie.

LOLZ

You really are a moron. 

[James Young]

You really are a moron.  

And you really have no idea about public policy, institutional behavior, economics, critical thinking or anything other than trite, puerile reactionary talking points that you get from Beck or Limbaugh, do you?  with conservatives like you, I'm glad to be  liberal.

[hounddog]

 
And you really have no idea about public policy, institutional behavior, economics, critical thinking or anything other than trite, puerile reactionary talking points that you get from Beck or Limbaugh, do you?  with conservatives like you, I'm glad to be  liberal.

[dazzleman]

In terms of the true cost of any tickets I've gotten, it has never been more than the actualy fine.

Apparently, my insurance companies have only run my driving record when they first wrote the policy, and my understanding is that they run your driving record if you file a claim, or have one filed against you (which hasn't happened with me yet).

So my insurance premiums never went up because of any of my tickets.  And I've switched insurance companies a few times, but I always had this uncanny ability to get tickets a short time after switching, but not before when they would run my record.

[Madman]

Could you tell me which ones do that? The radar in my cruiser is horribly out of date and I'd really like a new one but our bidget is stretched thin as it is right now. BTW, just in case you didn't catch it, that was my way of saying that I've never heard of such a thing in my 11 years in LE.

Horribly out-of-date?  Does that mean it's no longer accurate and prone to false readings?  Maybe if I get pulled over I should ask the officer how old his radar gun is?  Hmmmmmmm.............

[bing_oh]

Horribly out-of-date?  Does that mean it's no longer accurate and prone to false readings?  Maybe if I get pulled over I should ask the officer how old his radar gun is?  Hmmmmmmm.............

Actually it's huge and has piss poor range. Radar is checked for calibration at the beginning of every shift and after every citation. Nice try but that won't work. Next defense!

[dazzleman]

Actually it's huge and has piss poor range. Radar is checked for calibration at the beginning of every shift and after every citation. Nice try but that won't work. Next defense!

I know you're out there pulling over and ticketing all sorts of innocent people....

The real issue is traffic enforcement strategy, not how people are tagged.  I would bet my bottom dollar that about 99.9% of the people ticketed for speeding are guilty as charged, so all this talk about whether radar is accurate is nonsense, IMO.

But I do think that in many places, speed limits are placed too low, so that people can be ticketed for driving at safe speeds as a revenue raiser.  I don't blame the police for this.  Many people insist upon low speed limits, especially in their local neighborhoods, because they think it keeps them safer.  But I think that speed limits that are too low breed disrespect for the law because everybody violates them.

From an enforcement perspective, issuing speeding tickets is going for the low-hanging fruit in a lot of cases.  Speeding is one of those vioations that a driver does continuously over a period of time and distance, as opposed to others, like passing a red light, that take place in a split second.  So speeders are easier to catch.  Also, people behave themsleves if an officer in a marked car is near them, and you can't catch people for many other offenses without being out in traffic.

So it's easy to say that the police are wrong to focus on speeders, but it's not that simple.  Like most things, there is not a perfect black-and-white answer.  The reality of keeping our roads as safe as possible falls in shades of grey.

[Klackamas]

Well, I don't think 99.9% is accurate. It's a nice round number, but no. I would take that bet and win it. 999 out of 1000 isn't reasonable.

If the police are getting free or partially paid radar guns from insurance companies, it's a conflict of interest.


I wish the police would spend a little less time going after speed and a little more going after distracted drivers yakking on the phone.

[hounddog]

Well, I don't think 99.9% is accurate. It's a nice round number, but no. I would take that bet and win it. 999 out of 1000 isn't reasonable.

O....K....?

If the police are getting free or partially paid radar guns from insurance companies, it's a conflict of interest.

I have a hard time believing many do, if any.  In the past they probably did, heck, many of our cars in DPD have no radar at all for a long time.

Mostly what you hear anytime a company claims to be "giving" something to the police is a situation where the departments have to prove a need based on merit, and then the company greatly "up-plays" their involvement and generosity.  

PR and marketing are the real villans in this, not the PDs.

I wish the police would spend a little less time going after speed and a little more going after distracted drivers yakking on the phone.

"Yakking" on the phone is only enforcable when a jurisdictional body (local, county or state) make it a crime, and most places have yet to do that.  Texting, on the other hand is illegal in Michigan now.  The problem comes in determining if a person is simply entering a security code to get their VMs, which is not illegal, or if they are sending nekked pics of themselves to some weirdo on the other end.

And, whenever drivers see someone pulled over they almost always assume it is for speed, so you really have no idea what officers are stopping people for.

[dazzleman]

Well, I don't think 99.9% is accurate. It's a nice round number, but no. I would take that bet and win it. 999 out of 1000 isn't reasonable.

If the police are getting free or partially paid radar guns from insurance companies, it's a conflict of interest.


I wish the police would spend a little less time going after speed and a little more going after distracted drivers yakking on the phone.

I was being a bit facetious with the 99.99% number, but I think you know what I mean.  So many people claim they're innocent when they get popped for speeding, but the vast, vast majority are guilty as charged and just want to whine.


As for your suggestion that the police go after other violations, that's a different issue and I agree with you in an ideal world.  The nincompoop women (and it is usually women) who are yakking on their cellphones and paying no attention to the road are a major hazard.  Something like that should be the equivalent of going about 25 mph over the speed limit.  I do think speed violations are overemphasized, but I can understand the practical reasons why, as I explained in a previous post.

[Rupert]

Dave, I see many people of both sexes talking on cell phones in their cars. It's possible that there are more women, but not many more.

[James Young]

The real issue is traffic enforcement strategy, not how people are tagged.  I would bet my bottom dollar that about 99.9% of the people ticketed for speeding are guilty as charged, so all this talk about whether radar is accurate is nonsense, IMO.

The real issue of traffic enforcement is its assumption that their extant behavior affects traffic safety.  LE behavior COULD affect traffic safety but as practiced right now, they have abrogated their moral superiority and become prostitutes to economics and political power.  To continue the sham is a lie, a deliberate false assertion with intent to deceive, yet this belief is fostered in courtrooms, in the media and the continuing barrage of propaganda by those who benefit from the lie.
 
They only way to quantify traffic safety is by using three measures that we have had for nearly 100 years and source for which is primarily LE reports; therefore, we cannot be accused of manipulating stats to create a particular picture.  These measures are the fatality rate, the injury rate and the crash rate, each per 100,000,000 vehicle miles traveled (VMT). 
 
There is no correlation between any of these rates and posted speed limits, actual driving speeds [30th, 50th, 85th or 95th percentiles ? makes no difference] or the intensity of LE effort.  The old theory was that a speeding citation caused a driver to slow down and that slowing down made him safer.  None of that is empirically true.  BTW, the most common pre-crash critical event is distractions internal to the vehicle, e.g., cell phones, kids fighting, something loose, fiddling with the dashboard controls, etc. 
 
Let?s assume, just for a moment, that 99.9% of the drivers cited were guilty as charged.  So what?  That tells us nothing beyond the unavoidable interpretation that speed limits are set too low.  It does not identify dangerous behavior nor does it improve driving.  It does have a consequence that it erodes respect for LE and the law itself; if the law believes that, then the law is an ass (apologies to Charles Dickens).
   
Radar and later generation speed-measuring devices have so distorted the behavior of LE away from the potential social benefit to the real economic benefit to jurisdictions, the transfer of approximately $100 billion a year from the public to those jurisdictions.  None of this affects  the three key rates, which just keep improving slowly but steadily due to improved technology of vehicles and roadways. 
   
I fully support recruiting better candidates for LE, better training, better equipment, better techniques, better testing ? competence and psychological profiling -- better pay and better benefits for LE.  This support comes with a quid pro quo:  LE has to abandon its failed philosophy and adopt newer and more effective behavior.  My suggestion to abandon an obsolete radar unit because it was ineffective in identifying and dealing with impeding was ignored.  Such a response is all too typical of sycophants and apologists who cannot recognize that impeding is a behavior remediable by the education function of LE but it reinforces the perception of LE as resistant to change. 
   
Instead, LE goes after the low-hanging fruit of speeders because it is easy and it is profitable.  Yet, speeding does not even register as a critical pre-crash event in NHTSA terminology, i.e., causes of crashes; and the more descriptive ?speed inappropriate for conditions? is associated with only about 4% of crashes.  OTOH, suicide has been estimated to be responsible for anywhere from 6% to 18% of fatalities, with a very clear inverse correlation with GDP and employment.   But I have never seen or heard ? and believe me, I have looked ? of a LEO stopping a driver and seeking or assisting in finding psychological intervention. 
   
I have been told that LEOs cannot possible be trained to identify and intervene in drivers-intent-on-suicide but this is about four times more important than ?speed too fast for conditions,? on which traffic enforcement spends more than two times all other violations combined (TX DPS).
   
I challenge all of our resident LEOs to think outside the box ? and even the room where the box is ? to bring these radical ideas to your forces, to elevate yourself above the list of lazy sellouts who cannot or will not think beyond their next paycheck.  Make yourself more professional and create a contribution to society that perhaps you never envisioned. 
   

[Klackamas]

I know you're a little left of center, but you sound downright paranoid.

Don't drive like an asshole and you'll generally be OK.

[bing_oh]

I know you're a little left of center, but you sound downright paranoid.

Don't drive like an asshole and you'll generally be OK.

Jimmy's always been a paranoid extremist on anything law enforcement related. Now, he's gone beyond paranoid into extreme egotism boardering on narcissism. He claims superiority over every LEO, LE administrator, politician, and civil engineer by essentially stating that he's totally correct on traffic enforcement issues and they're totally wrong. Not to mention that he's flat-out said that any LEO who doesn't agree with him is a poorly trained, lower intelligence, morally-bankrupt member of a vast conspiracy to violate the civil liberties of every motorist in the country, while LEO's who do agree with him are morally-superior and in need of raises and better benefits.

[dazzleman]

Dave, I see many people of both sexes talking on cell phones in their cars. It's possible that there are more women, but not many more.

Haha, do you ever go off Gloria Allred patrol?  You take this stuff WAY too seriously, man. 

You're right that it's not only women, but anecdotally it seems like a lot more women than men who yakk on the phone while they're driving.  Most men aren't as fond of talking on the phone in any case.  But we do other stuff, so I guess it evens out.

[GoCougs]

Primary points in which I agree with James Young:

1.) Any law that makes many/majority/most citizens law breakers/infractors, as do speed limits on many roads, is by definition bad (immoral) law.

2.) LE would make the roads MUCH safer by diverting speed enforcement efforts toward improving flow of traffic (left lane campers, clamping down on big rigs) and targeting TRULY dangerous drivers; as noted, distracted drivers plus obvious road ragers, tail gaters, etc.

3.) The "crime" or "infraction" of speeding, in and of itself, baring extreme recklessness (150 mph on a crowded freeway), is nothin' about nothin'.

Primary points in which I disagree with James Young:

1.) I don't think the revenue motive exists en masse. There is simply too much cost eaten up in court and administrative costs to make it a material "profit" center.

2.) It is simply too expensive to tailor speed limits to each and every (stretch of) road to match actual speed driven.

3.) There are still TONS of bad drivers on the roads today, and something has to be done, and IMO the

My judgment overall:

Traffic enforcement is indeed poor in the US. The over emphasis on speed enforcement costs lives and pain and suffering. Much of this is in the hands of the legislature; LE can't self-direct (which is a good thing). In relative terms, the US has by far and away the most favorable traffic enforcement and treatment of automobiles in general, out of the whole of the West. Things could be MUCH worse.

[Rupert]

Haha, do you ever go off Gloria Allred patrol?  You take this stuff WAY too seriously, man.  

You're right that it's not only women, but anecdotally it seems like a lot more women than men who yakk on the phone while they're driving.  Most men aren't as fond of talking on the phone in any case.  But we do other stuff, so I guess it evens out.

Hey, I'm just matching your anecdotes with my anecdotes to show that maybe anecdotes aren't the best way to make a point.