According to the internet, Switzerland enforces speeding laws with progressive ticketing, in which tickets are made proportional to the driver's income. This is meant to hold wealthy drivers accountable to speeding laws as well as regular folks for whom a $50 or $200 ticket is a reasonable disincentive, for relatively minor infractions that don't quickly add up to a suspended license. Such a thing does not, of course, exist in the US. Among other things, the size of the country and the complexity of overlapping jurisdictions would make it difficult for ticketing police to have easy and secure access to income levels for all drivers.
Here in Santa Monica, there are many, many luxury vehicles on the roads, being driven by what I assume are wealthy drivers. In nearly a year of crossing these streets, I would say that the drivers of luxury cars, particularly sports cars, are more likely to be driving at dangerously high speeds, to breeze through a crosswalk when a pedestrian is in the street, and to weave in and out of traffic, compared to the general population of vehicles.
I propose fining these traffic violations in proportion to the value of the car, either from a quick Kelley's Blue Book value lookup based on model and year, or, should California go back to regular annual vehicle taxes, based on the vehicle tax basis amount. That basis would eliminate the privacy and complexity issues in tracking down a driver's income. And the occasional outrageously high speeding ticket, like the $290,000 ticket in Switzerland , serves both as a reminder to drive safely and how far the wealth of the elite is from that of the middle class.
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