[funetical]

Licensing does force accountability because it takes you out of the realm of anonymity. Insuring, just a side product of licensing.

[London]

Originally Posted by theferndog

London you've finally realized what I've been saying that the main reason licensing and insurance would fail is that there is too little money to be made there. The answer is teach safety at an early age. I just hope in your case you never have to make right any damage and that you never hit a car.

ferndog: All this time I thought you were promoting the idea of license and registration. I reread your stuff. YOU wanted it earlier. Now you've backed down to "teach the kids early."

I'm out of this thread. It's giving me a headache.

[funetical]

I think early child hood preventative education is a joke. Look at DARE. Abstinence education, name it. They don't work. If they do it's on such a minimal level it doesn't impact.

[sarahk]

I'm in New Zealand where we have a thing called ACC which gives us "no fault" as well but we pay levies through our employers, car registration, motor cycle registration etc. Even my 8 year old had to pay ACC when he had some work acting in tv commercials. Now they're trying to raise their "income" by increasing the levies and spreading the net a bit wider.

First stop motorcyclists since cars have annoying habits of knocking them off and that costs money to patch them up - so lets charge the riders more.

Second stop - lets hit the cyclists up for NZ$300-500 per bike. A typical ma & pa or kids bike costs about $500 so it seems ridiculous to charge an annual fee the equivalent of the cost of the purchase price. We're trying to fight obesity, get people to choose healthy activities and then we tax them back indoors. Madness.

Add to that a thin piece of plastic/tin whatever that will slice right through me when I do end up in a tangle on my bike. Yay! That sounds nice. The plastic surgeons will have fun sewing those tendons/viens/etc back up.

Lets consider what the real problems are.

You are required to stay at the scene of an accident
You are required to give correct particulars - our police use their cellphones to take photos if you don't have your license on when they are checking your name against the database they can also check your photo

We have technology, we don't have to go backwards, lets move forward...

[funetical]

If something works you don't stop doing it in favor of technology. You pursue it. If the metal on your bike ain't going to shred you this won't either. What else, oh yeah this is just to force you out of anonymity there by making you accountable. Does it make sense to charge somebody more than the damage? No. But I payed a lot in insurance fees and didn't even get in one wreck. This is a debate in semantics.

[Industry_Hack]

Originally Posted by sarahk

I'm in New Zealand where we have a thing called ACC which gives us "no fault" as well but we pay levies through our employers, car registration, motor cycle registration etc. Even my 8 year old had to pay ACC when he had some work acting in tv commercials. Now they're trying to raise their "income" by increasing the levies and spreading the net a bit wider.

First stop motorcyclists since cars have annoying habits of knocking them off and that costs money to patch them up - so lets charge the riders more.

Second stop - lets hit the cyclists up for NZ$300-500 per bike. A typical ma & pa or kids bike costs about $500 so it seems ridiculous to charge an annual fee the equivalent of the cost of the purchase price. We're trying to fight obesity, get people to choose healthy activities and then we tax them back indoors. Madness.

Add to that a thin piece of plastic/tin whatever that will slice right through me when I do end up in a tangle on my bike. Yay! That sounds nice. The plastic surgeons will have fun sewing those tendons/viens/etc back up.

Lets consider what the real problems are.

You are required to stay at the scene of an accident
You are required to give correct particulars - our police use their cellphones to take photos if you don't have your license on when they are checking your name against the database they can also check your photo

We have technology, we don't have to go backwards, lets move forward...

But you live in New Zealand! That makes up for a lot.

[sarahk]

Originally Posted by Industry_Hack

But you live in New Zealand! That makes up for a lot.

It does indeed.

Just becomes so tricky to draw the line and say you pay you income tax and we want a bit more because this activity is riskier than most... and define those activities fairly.

One thing I know for sure, I'm glad my career isn't focussed on working it out.