Having just been in Chicago, one of the most prevalent subject of conversation (despite the football season of course) is the ever-rising number of tickets being given to drivers. The Daley administration first made Chicago the most expensive parking city in the country with a corrupt deal that bordered on the criminal. The city was also accused of corrupt dealings with the company handling red-light ticking. However, none of this has curtailed the city contractors and officials clipping motorists for revenue in the form of endless ticketing. The latest outrage was the city reducing the time of yellow lights — a small tweak of a second that resulted in nearly $8 million in new tickets. Drivers are being treated as sources for revenue and hit with the equivalent of speed traps and short lights to generate more and more tickets.
Near my mother’s house in Chicago, she constantly warns me of such a trap that suddenly reduces car speed to a crawl. The reason is that it is being treated as a school zone even though there is no school nearby. All of her neighbors have been clipped despite driving less then 40 miles per hour on the main street.
The short yellow lights resulted in thousands of new $100 tickets from red light cameras. These cameras seem to function as a new hidden tax but the cost is not just cash by destroying the driving records of citizens – impacting insurance and, for many, their jobs.
Chicago may have picked up this idea from the Florida Department of Transportation which in 2011 secretly reduced the length of yellow lights and bringing in a windfall. Since most people have a common notion of the length of time, a small tweak can catch them off guard and snare their cars in a red light run.
It would seem logical that all yellow lights should have a uniform standard time to avoid this type of manipulation. At a minimum, Chicagoans have got to rise up against this type of revenue-generated traffic trap. People are struggling in Chicago and they do not need city officials manipulating lights to find new ways to siphon us more of their money (before they have to pay the over-priced meters of course).
Source: Time
@Annie
I deleted them from this Gravatar.
Hey Penelope, what happened to the other websites on your Gravitar profile? I was going to check them out a few minutes ago, did some chores came back to them and then poof they are gone! LOL! Oh well they looked really interesting.
For want of a lass, poor Yorick was lost!
Doc,
On behalf of all the veterans, I want to thank you for being concerned about our retirement benefits. It’s the least we should expect for our commitment to the national defense and knowing you value that, speaks volumes of you character.
If you could also focus on simplifying the tax code so we can keep more of it then we would be doubly grateful.
Oh, and fix that yellow light problem too!
Thanks again. 🙂
Annie, I know I am not rich.
Doc, I am tired of hearing about the poor and middle class. And the rich. If you are too poor to pay, no tax. And, of course, the rush to provide free stuff will leave the rest of us in the dust!
Doc, some folks think they are rich.They don’t quite get it that things that would benefit the truly rich would not be beneficial to them. It’s that ‘wannabe rich’ syndrome that clouds reason.
Dusty
The choice between current tax code and reform is not a flat tax.
A flat tax is regressive – hurts the poor and middle class.
doc, Sales Tax is “regressive.” Is anyone else, like me, opposed to that extortion?
Income tax cannot hurt the “poor” who do not pay it, can it? When you say “middle class,” where is the tipping point on the scale of dollar income, or the proportion of the “middle class” population, where it crosses over from “hurting” to not hurting? You’re not asserting that taxes hurt ALL the middle class, are you? That sounds awfully Republican to me.
Sandi,
Have you met Paul S?
He has told us he is a member of Mensa. Maybe he was kidding.
I didn’t say “all” were, that left room for true Geniuses. Doing something stupid is completely different than stupid (I.e. Pelosi).
I’ve known some Mensa folks who were pretty damned stupid!
Sandi – I had a professor who fell out a window and then later walked into wall on his way out of the hospital. There is no correlation between intelligence and stupid behavior. One can only think of all the activities of the Greeks on all those campuses across the country. In fact, in my long lifetime, I think just about every category of person I know has done something stupid, including people on this blog. 😉
“The phrase is ” I COULDN”T care less.”
Depends. Maybe I do care some now but could conceive of caring less in the future than I do now. There are some things that I really could not care less about because I don’t care at all, many of which surface in practically every thread it seems.
Regarding taxes. The tax code, as complex as it is, is the code that we have. You can’t fault people for using every and all strategies to maximize their income. If you don’t like this, then change the code. Agitate for a flat tax.
I have a CPA do my taxes but really only for the liability issues and the ability to have that CPA represent you if you are audited. Probably I’m a bit of an outlier because I have spent much of the last 10 years of my career as a financial planner and part of the requirements and training and continuing education for that designation is to have a good grasp of the tax code and the various strategies available.
AAAAAND…..what does this have to do with the traffic lights, other than to reveal the the government is grasping for our money, rifling through our couch cushions for loose change and in general shaking us down on all levels, from Federal to Municipal.
My next agenda, Olly, is making sure you can continue to collect your pension.
Everybody watch. Nick now embraces a NEW word. We’ve progressed from the tired “feeeeeeelings” (did I get enough ‘e’ in there?) to the brand spanking new and all-caps ‘fairness’. Watch for it. It should appear in his next 150 posts. That should carry him through the next two days.. I think ‘cultists’ has fallen out of favor.
meanwhile…
Any fool can see that paying $700 in federal income tax while loaning your campaign $11 million dollars is perfectly reasonable. It also is perfectly reasonable that that is what he paid for the last three years.
Keep it up folks. Ollie has a pension that will need paying you know.
docmadison – if he earned his $11 million honestly then he can spend it any way that is legal. Are you upset that he spent $11 million on his campaign or $700 in income tax. Really, this guy is my new hero. 🙂
I could care less; I just happen to consider speaking out against your ideology far too important to embrace apathy. What’s next on your agenda?
Sandi, It’s not about math for the class warriors. Math is logic. The warriors are all about “Feeeelings.” And, their favorite, “FAIRNESS.” We have many Barney Fife Fairness Sheriffs here. And, they get to define what is fair. And, as you perfectly pointed out, the top 10% paying 90% of the taxes is not “fair” enough for them. They never realize, “Sooner or later your run out of other people’s money.”
Nick, I fully understand the “fairness doctrine” which applies to anyone doing better than yourself. I want to be one of the 10% who don’t pay enough. My point was more about the tax code providing a $700 tax fee for someone obviously making more than I (who pays a great deal more than $700). This code is why Buffet pays no taxes. There is a solution to this (a dollar amount earned over which this tax break goes bye-bye). I’m getting closer to a Federal sales tax and no personal income tax. I know, the poor will be hurt, but they’re paying with my (our) money. I am not against paying taxes to this great country. I just want “true fairness “!
sandi,
That’s the problem when you own everything.
Don’t want to pay taxes?
Fine.
Become a healthcare assistant or a hedge fund manager.
Well, had to jump in. Top 10% pay 90% of taxes. Not enough? Good Lord!
Even Mensa Scholars misstate it.
If there was such a thing as Mensa Scholars I am sure they would not misstate it. However, Mensa Scholars are like unicorns, a mythical creature.
For lord sakes.
The phrase is constantly misstated.
The phrase is ” I COULDN”T care less.
Olly,
The US Treasury has signed your checks for many years and will for many more. It is best to hope that the rest of us continue to pay taxes and that the top 10% have a tax rate greater than .000001%.