Fines based on wealth - do Finland have it right or wrong?

[johnster1991]

After seeing this story in today's Metro (linked) it got me thinking, is this a good or a bad thing that a fine would be based on wealth? Surely driving 48mph in a 30mph zone doesn't warrant a £60,000 fine just because you're rich?

http://metro.co.uk/2013/10/15/multi-millionaire-fi...

[johnster1991]

Rawwr said:

I can see the point. If I had an obscene disposable income, would I care about a £60 speeding fine?

True, £60 would mean that you would happily do it again without thinking I guess

ETA - as others say though, points could mean you would lose your licence eventually anyway

[johnster1991]

mmm-five said:

You have to ask yourself what the point of the fine is in the first place.

If it's just an admin fee, then it should be the same for everyone.

If it's a punishment, then it needs to have the same effect on everyone, so for someone earning £1000 a week a £100 fine might hurt them enough to make them think twice. However if you're on £10000 a week, that £100 probably wouldn't have the same penalising effect on you - so it seems fair to take it to a £1000 fine, so that it's the same percentage of income.

However, I wouldn't like to see that come in over here as while my income seems a lot to some people, it's very sporadic and an average over the last 4 years would be about 1/4 of the average over the last 12 months - and the 'spare' cash I've got at the end of the month would not currently cover a 10% 'weekly gross income' fine.

Maybe a proper means tested fine would work? So that if you could provide genuine evidence that what you have left of weekly earnings is minimal, then your fine should be 50% of that

This is a good point, and could possibly be a good solution for this, although I feel that there should probably be a cap on the fine up to a point, it mentions in the article that someone once received a fine of £180,000 I think that that is taking it a bit too far no matter how much you earn