The Haifa daycare study can’t be used to extrapolate much.

They fined parents (IIRC) ~$3 per late pickup. Rerun the study with a $300 fine and let’s see how it pans out. It’s an interesting finding, but that then people take it to mean that fines don’t work (no matter their size) is insane.

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sejje 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I worked in childcare about 20 years ago, and we charged $1 per minute late.

We had to keep two staff there, and they would split the fine.

Many times we got stiffed.

Edit: for reference, our fee was about $14/day to keep the kid, so it was a pretty stiff penalty.

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sowbug an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I get your point, but I doubt the fine could have been ethically higher. Domino's drivers killed dozens of people in speed-related accidents before they ended their 30-minute guarantee.

I don't think our society is ready for the combination of automatic enforcement and truly punitive penalties. We readily demonize the accused; just having your mugshot taken can end your employability. Yet many of us break laws daily -- speeding, jaywalking, watering the lawn during the day, even plugging in a microwave oven without a building permit in some jurisdictions -- and society still works because we don't expect much enforcement. We are heading toward a future where everyone will have marks on their permanent record, but today our society tut-tuts, or much worse, at anyone who does.

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jaredklewis 20 minutes ago | parent [-]

I don't think you did get my point (my fault perhaps), as my only point is that if you take away from the Haifa study that fines will automatically increase the prevalence the targeted behavior in all situations, that's an insane conclusion to draw. There are lots of variables at play: the size of the fine, how consistently and strictly it is enforced, the ability of the finer to collect the fine, the social context, and so on. The Haifa study examines none of these. It does does highlight an interesting phenomenon, but without further studies that control for these variables, I don't think we can just blindly assume that the outcome in the Haifa day cares will apply to all situations where a fine is levied.

I see all the time on the Internet (and even IRL once) people make claims like, "oh, carbon taxes will just increase CO2 output, you know like in that Israeli daycare study." Drives me nuts.

Are fines the best possible solution to this particularly traffic problem? I have no idea. I'm not an expert in this area. But I am highly confident that whatever relation it has to the Haifa daycare study is so incredibly tenuous that it is not worth mentioning.

	▲	sowbug a few seconds ago \| parent [-]
		We might be talking past each other. Call Haifa a parable, if you will. I understand why you find fault with the study, but I invoked it to call out, to quote myself, that a fine can also give permission for unwanted behavior. That point adds to yours and doesn't contradict it. The reason I said anything in the first place is that I object to automatically administered punishment. Either separately can be OK. Automatically administered? No problem, that's called a tax (including use taxes like tolls). Punishment? Then we'd better have due process, and yeah, it's going to be expensive and labor-intensive to administer. That's critical in a free country. That's why I called out the "is better than" quote. I think it's strictly worse.

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vrosas 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

My daycare fines parents $5 _per minute_ of lateness.

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jakobobobo 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A $3 fine is a good portion of someone's disposable income and a $300 fine is not much of someone else's.. A civil penalty of that nature almost guarantees some part of the population will view it like the $3 fee.

	▲	hunter2_ 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		This is exactly why license points (leading to suspension) are better than fines. If the ticketing decision made by an automated camera system is deemed acceptable when issuing mere fines akin to parking tickets, but deemed unacceptable when issuing other penalties (which don't have this wealth inequity issue we are discussing now, at least not exclusively), that's effectively a poor tax.

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gambiting 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I mean as a much greater "study", look at the UK - government introduced fines for parents of kids missing school, and the rate of absenced increased - because parents see it more as a cost that you just have to pay to go on holiday during school year.