I wonder if insurance would be a partial solution? Allow/encourage providers of liability insurance to raise rates on people with tickets, unless they are to the electronic limit.
In theory, yes. In practice typical insurance requirements are already far below realistic modern-day damages possible from vehicular collisions, and people still routinely drive without even that minimal insurance.
Without better mechanisms to actually meaningfully enforce insurance requirements, changes to those requirements are unlikely to be effective.
The elephant in the room in the US is that although driving is a (very dangerous and extremely socially-costly) privilege, any attempts to hold drivers accountable and take away that privilege from repeat offenders is treated as a rights violation, so instead we just accept many deaths of innocent people from repeat DUI and speeders.
No, draconian punishment of uninsured drivers should go way up. I am already paying a lot of money to compensate for them; I shouldn't pay more. Auto insurance is extremely expensive already.
My point is the overall cost of any level of insurance is way higher than it should be because of uninsured drivers. Maybe, if we solved that, everybody should be able to afford a higher level of coverage to better account for serious accidents.
Just put it in yearly registration fee, like most modern countries do.
The profits stay within the government, fees can be easily adjusted to inflation and is enforced onto everyone thus reducing the headache for drivers and cops.
Then you'll have people not registering their cars. Which already happens a lot. They steal a plate or renewal sticker from another car or just drive with it expired.
Maybe. I see cars driving around without any visible plates at all sometimes, and they don't seem to get pulled over. Traffic violations seem to be the lowest priority for cops the past few years.
I think if you're the sort of person who would drive with a suspended license you would also drive with expired plates and no insurance.
Agreed. I don't want more uninsured drivers on the road.
Maybe in this case it could work like child support: you pay the state, the state pays the insurance on your behalf, and if you don't pay the state then they're the ones coming after you.
At some point you might have to decide between letting the state garnish your wages, or giving up your car.