Autonomous Cars and the Public Budget.

Driving back from Toronto on Thursday, it was obvious that the Police were doing one of their periodic money harvest from motorist.

Fair enough, but it go me thinking, if we get self driving cars, tickets will be a thing of the past. Since the state counts on this source of funding to stay solvent, where will the money come from? Also, what will happen to insurance companies who not only need drivers, but need to raise their rates based on these same speeding tickets?

Interesting thoughts there. Insurance rates are also based on age and gender. How would that play with autonomous cars.

I suspect states would create new and essentially fictitious crimes for autonomous cars and riders, like not being in a constant state of driver readiness, improper sleeping, response test zones, etc.

Don't worry, if there is one thing the government knows, it's creative financing.

The easy way would be an autonomous car registration fee. Then the could collect the money and have fewer officers. A win-win.

There will surely be some kind of tax to pick up the deficit.

Well, regarding insurance, there will still be other, non-autonomous cars out there for a while so there should be some money to be made there.

The day may come, too, if it's not already here, where older cars can become an insurance liability.

"Had your antiquated collector vehicle been equipped with traction-control, stability-control, active-suspension, cruise-control-following-ability, blah-blah-blah, this accident would never have happened."

I suppose the car makers will lock things down in the legal system so that we can never actually own a self-driving car. It will be an IP deal where it is always their property no matter that we may have bought it and have the title to it.

I truly expect insurance and registration will become mileage based so that the more on drives the more one pays. This would probably already be the case but for the trucking lobby.

Will we be able to send our self-driving car on errands without us? Could we send it to the drive through to pick up dinner? Could it go pick up junior from soccer practice? Why would there be the need for a licensed driver in there? Will it be possible to get a DUI if you behind the wheel of a car that drives itself?

Presuming autonomous cars will be tracking their movement and location in real-time, it would then become very easy to charge a per-mile/per-state fee(possibly even factoring weight). So at that point it becomes rather easy government agencies to base their funding around this data/revenue stream.

I really hope I'm not around to find out the answers to these questions... I find the prospect of autonomous cars downright depressing. Then again I find the general direction of society as a whole pretty sad.

On the flip side, im sure autonomous vehicles will all have their own embedded id similar to an imei number used in tech devices. This will allow the automaker and the government the ability to track and store the use of your private vehicle. They'll know your preferred route to work, the fact that you went out to the hardware store 3 times on Saturday afternoon because you kept forgetting things, your filling habits, your shopping habits and anything else you do with said vehicle.

The way data retention is progressing, it won't be to long till each and every person has a government gathered profile, where your movements, purchases and communications are all logged, collated and packaged into a Nice little bundle for intelligence agencies to supervise, hackers to steal and potential employers, creditors and other service providers to access and use against you.

Don't get me wrong, im no tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist... It's just that we seem to be at a bit of a crossroads of technological advancement vs personal freedom. Most people seem unaware of the direction things are heading and what the repercussions will be over the long term. Humans seem to be hell bent on making themselves redundant.

^That's not tinfoil hat stuff, that's pretty close to what's actually happening right now in fact.

Governments could save money in court costs (far less accidents = far less lawsuits), health care costs (unless we're talking the US or Somalia ), and law enforcement costs (virtually no traffic violations = less cops needed) just off the top of my head.

Body shops are the ones that are really going to get the worst of it, something like 90% of accidents are caused by driver error. I don't know what fraction of overall body damage is due to driver error but it's probably the vast majority as well.