Guest Post by Eric Peters
Does it make sense to play by the rules when the rules no longer apply? Well, when they only apply to you?
If you own a car, you are forced to “cover” it with an insurance policy that costs what you’d never freely pay – and what the insurance mafia could never get away with charging – if you were free to say no this “coverage.”
Many people do say no to it. They are too poor to afford it and just drive, sans the “coverage.”
And they “get away” with it.
Bully!
Nothing is done to them because they have nothing more for the government – which promulgates the rules – to take. Perhaps their car, but if they are poor (or smart) it is probably a beater and they can just go out and buy another car – with the money they didn’t spend on a piece of paper (i.e., the “policy”). 
Some aren’t here legally and have also said no to the driver’s license – the government ID card, really – that rule-abiders are also forced to get and carry (as well as pay for) according to the rules of the game.
The system doesn’t care much about such people because there is no money in them. It is rare for them to be kept in jail because that would be a liability rather than an asset. And the government – despite what is said about its book-keeping competence – knows all about profit and loss.
If the unlicensed, “undocumented” and uninsured driver doesn’t cause any harm then no one is harmed and there is no problem – or shouldn’t be. Well, morally. It is a strange thing indeed that some people have a problem with people who’ve not caused any harm and desire to harm them for it, legally.
Which brings us to the other side of this double-headed wooden nickel: 
It is the unappetizing fact that the licensed, documented and forcibly “covered” driver who causes no harm to anyone is harmed – by being made to pay for harms he hasn’t caused.
Over and over again. To the tune of many thousands of dollars. Money that could have been used to pay off the car or fix the car or buy a new car. Or buy food. Many things of tangible more value than a piece of paper (i.e., a “policy”).
The rule-abiding are made to pay for the harms they haven’t caused by people who cause immense harm to all, by threatening them with it, constantly. And applying it, frequently.
These people don’t play by the rules, themselves. They exempt themselves from their own rules, such as – most glaringly – their orders to us – the rule-abiders – to commit economic seppuku by “locking” ourselves “down” while declaring themselves and their economic well-being “essential.”
The playing board is tilted; the deck is stacked. The dice are loaded. The whole thing is a fantastic gyp – and only a mark plays by its rules.
Of course, it is difficult for us rule-abiders to stop playing by the rules when we know the rules can be applied . . . to us. It is risky to drive around without government ID – a “license” – and a piece of paper that shows you were a good obedient serf and paid for the “coverage” you would’t have bought – were you free not to buy it – when you have a job or car that’s worth anything or money they can seize, directly or indirectly (as via fines that can be turned over to a collections agency).
But the rules are on the verge of changing – because the wheels are on the verge of coming off. The system is rapidly losing – has arguably already lost – the moral authority necessary for general rule-abiding. Why should we play along when they do not?
Indeed.
The laws are arbitrary and selectively applied. Only a fool respects them when he doesn’t absolutely have to (as when there is am immediate threat of repercussions for not respecting them). As for example the various “mask” rules – which the “mask” rule orderers selectively obeyed, themselves.
Mock the “masks,” then. Many did. Wear sheer women’s panty hose, for instance. Or show the nose – to show contempt.
The first and arguable critical blow is to shatter respect for rules that are unjust, applied arbitrarily and enforced selectively. If it lands, such a blow can stagger the very foundation of not just a particular rule but the general class of unjust, arbitrary and selectively enforced rules.
Many of us do this already, every time we drive – by driving as fast as we can “get away” with, regardless of the rule that we drive this fast and no faster. We do so because we know the rule is arbitrary, selectively enforced and enforced by those who ignore the very rules they enforce – by driving faster than the rules say anyone may.
Except, of course, themselves.
Perhaps you notice a pattern . . .
Insurance isn’t a vile thing in its essence. But it becomes an evil thing when it is forcibly imposed. Because it is evil to harm people who’ve not harmed people – and that is the essence of what forcing people to pay for “coverage” (or anything else) is.
The evil compounds by dint of the forcing – because when you are forced to buy, the seller can charge what he likes.
And so, they do.
But how to “get away” with not playing by these rules? One way – a legal way – is to drive as value-less a car as you can get away with – and pay not a cent more than the rules say you must. Or get a scooter/moped – which in some areas you are not required to get a government ID card (“license”) to operate or “cover.”
Or – and the time is nigh – summon your inner Nancy Reagan and just say no.
Or rather, say nothing at all. Just kind of fade into the background. Stop playing the fixed game and adhering to rules that apply – hard – only to those foolish enough to still playing by them.
They can “get” some of us. But they can’t get all of us.
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My favourite charge on my insurance bill is the uninsured motorist premium. So not only do the skids get away with not paying insurance, I have to pay more in case I get involved in an accident with one of these bastards, which would more than likely be his fault.
You must live in the communist state of michigan. I just asked my wife if she has ever heard anything about all the cars that have “no” tags on them. We had to renew our tags with proof of insurance. I also wonder if they paid sales tax on this used car.
I live in the dump known as Michigan. I’m gonna cancel my insurance all summer and ride my bike/take Ubers if necessary than pay for the highest-priced insurance in the country. When I renew, it will be only for the month it takes me to move to Greater Idaho.
Mr. P.
Reading previous posts with your input, I infer that you reside in Canuckistan.
Most UI driver insurance is optional here in the USSA.
Although it may be required if the bank lienholds your vehicle.
True that in Canukistan?
You owe the bank you fully insure, no options. If you own a beater, own it, you can buy what is called PL and PD, public liability and property damage to protect the other guy and yourself from a lawsuit should you be responsible for an accident. All other levels of insurance such as fire, theft, etc., need not be purchased if your car is a beater and you can afford to get another beater. When the cost of repair is more than the value of the car it is time to get rid of the car.
Mr. Peters;
You and many people are late to the party.
An auto is a liability. It should be as disposable as a bic lighter.
I like to say when one of my vehicles has a major mechanical failure, I park it on the side of the road, unload my gear, take the plates off, light in on fire, and walk away.
Some snoot always says “Yeah, but they’ll trace the VIN back to you”
And I say “How? It’s not registered or titled to me.”
Possession is 9/10 of the law. If a vehicle is in my possession, it doesn’t need to be titled or registered to me.
Thus alleviating considerable liability.
As for insurance, few states (i.e. Arizona) have insurance linked to registrations. Most states simply require that you provide proof of insurance when an officer asks. These all look different, and can easily be printed with a home printer (many valid ones are, as policies are now sent by email). To my knowledge (YMMV), no police officer can verify the insurance in the average traffic stop interval.
There are multitudes of ways around what you “have” to do.
There are those who get angry about others not playing by the rules, and those who look at which rules have enforceable penalty, and what is required to circumvent those with enforceable penalty.
Simply look at it as a business expense. The cost of doing business in a ‘civilized’ society.
And the more that authority ignores the rules in application to themselves, the less respect there is for the rule of law.
And, personally, it pleases me greatly.
How did you get the tag asshole, that YOU REMOVED before lighting the vehicle on fire??? The clerk’s office does not issue a tag to the invisible man. I know, your mom took the liability on her shoulders to plate the car….right?
No. My mom is dead 20 years now. Cancer.
Register to a corporation.
Most states will set up a corporation on line, without any evidence of identity.
All property that could be a liability (and that’s pretty much all property) should be registered to a corporation under your control (but not nominally).
This has the added benefit of abstracting valuable property from you in the event you are sued (it is invisible in an asset search of you).
It’s OK. You haven’t even got to the party yet.
I can tell by the anger you have toward people that use the rules to their benefit.
And you’re stuck doing things the way you are told it has to be.
Fuji- I have a corporation and a car registered to said corporation. My CPA bill and annual fees would not make it a bargain, glad it works for you.
I’ve never been a principle in a corporation.
I’m more of a Resident Agent type.
I ‘own’ nothing of value. An asset search of me brings up nothing.
I’ve been nobody for almost 30 years.
If one is outsourcing his business operations (i.e.CPA), one could look for those who think outside the box and have high creativity. If the CPA is saving you more money than you pay him, keep him.
If you did not set up the corporation yourself, you should set one up just for the education (as should everyone), and preferably outside your local jurisdiction. Leave it on the shelf for future use should you need to move assets to protect them. If not, shelf corporations bring a decent premium depending on length of incorporation, should you decide to sell it at a later date.
Or not…
fuji-Corporations are people too_____ Mittens Romney
Exactly. Sorry I can only give you one thumbs up.
Until more people realize this, the gnashing of teeth will continue.
As long as they are people, why couldn’t your’s be that invisible friend you had as a kid?
You know, the one you blamed for everything when you got caught?
Like a car, a corporation is merely a tool to advance yourself.
And any decent tradesman has multiple tools in his toolbox.
And when you break one, you throw it away.
Most insurance cards are now computerized and the cop knows instantaneously whether or not you have any coverage, not to mention your tag would not come up in the data base for the vehicle you are driving. If you get stopped, you will get a quick reminder of who the real boss is, as you are arrested and your vehicle towed, with your gear in it.
You are correct.
As of 2015, 36 states have ALIR (automobile liability insurance reporting) programs.
These are not one standardized system, and are not without problems.
In many instances, unverified insurance does not constitute an impound or arrest event (it is usually a misdemeanor, resulting in citation).
Failure to produce is similar.
It appears TN has Electronic Verification of insurance via IICMVA. (https://www.iicmva.com/)
Interestingly, it is run through Dept. of Revenue. (revenue from licensing fees?)
There are a number of reasons why your TN insurance would unable to be verified in a stop.
https://revenue.support.tn.gov/hc/en-us/articles/360060282611-DIFD-5-Common-Reasons-Verification-System-Unable-to-Confirm-Policy
Failure to produce POI is a class C misdemeanor ($300 fine), and your vehicle may be impounded on officer’s discretion. This would be a citation, not arrest.
But if produced, but unconfirmed, you may not receive a fine, but notice to visit (https://www.driveinsuredtn.com/) to verify your insurance.
All the officer will see is that the insurance is “unconfirmed”.
But even receiving notification and failing to reply does not automatically result in registration suspension.
An officer can impound your vehicle or arrest you for any reason (i.e. don’t be a dick), but unconfirmed insurance might not rise to that level where all other things check out.
Much of this information is directly from TN DOR.
https://revenue.support.tn.gov/hc/en-us/categories/200926075-Drive-Insured-Tennessee
Yay.
…..shoulda used health insurance as the example.
Julio, T-bones you. Both go to the hospital. You and your insurance pay $275,000 for a week of looking at ugly fat nurses( what happened there, BTW). Julio gets the same service and his bill is $0.
But don’t worry about the hospital getting stiffed. They triple charged your services to cover his…..sweet
Actually, no.
Julio gets the same service you get on the government’s dime. The hospital that accepts him is federally funded, thus must accept all patients to maintain this federal funding. A private hospital will send Julio to the nearest public (federally funded) hospital. But the government is a stingy player. Their reimbursement rates for service of uninsured patients is like $0.20 on the dollar. And had you claimed to be uninsured, but said you would pay out of pocket, they will set up a payment plan to your liking, financed at 0% interest. Additionally, you could apply for a charity exemption, as all (federally funded) public hospitals are required to set aside 2% of services as charity work.
If you go the insurance route, there was an excellent article on here about how to negotiate billing with your insurance company, by HSF , I believe. But it was several years back.
Assuming how systems work is a fatal flaw in both engineering and life.
And the faulty assumptions about how a system works is passed down, leaving people who believe it angry when the system doesn’t work that way.
See my previous response to BL.
Blackbox engineering only works externally to the blackbox.
Disclaimer: Amounts may have changed as this information is a few years old.
Federally funded and accepting Medicare are not the same thing, as far as I know.
Correct. My comments have nothing to do with Medicare. It is a result of accepting federal monies for ANYTHING. The airport near where I fly out of has accepted federal monies for decades, and a commercial operator wanted to auxiliary base there. After much hullabaloo by the locals that don’t like airplane noise, their objections were dismissed. The airport has accepted federal monies and cannot refuse access to commercial operators.
Money is fungible. Take any federal money and they own you.
This is what we’ve decided to do. No health insurance. Just never give them your credit card. If something happens I will demand an itemized invoice too. Bet they can’t do it. We had some big bills a few years ago (had health insurance then). I tried to check what they were charging, for what, but couldn’t.
Health care/hospitals are asset stripping procedures for those who have some money.
To top it off an infection was received. In the hospital for 8 days and it appeared nowhere and no charges were made anywhere.
Stay out of the hospital if you can. You know things like broken stuff are a bit different.
This reminds me to put a few more things in one of our corporations.
Never use a credit card and never give an SSN.
They will offer you a considerable discount if you will use a credit card to just “be done with it”, but that means them, not you.
And always demand an itemized invoice.
If they cannot justify a charge, you can legally contest and most likely win.
Like any situation that may end up in court (which in this country is anything that happens from the time you wake up until you go to bed), one needs to document everything.
In court, documentation is king.
I’ve noticed a pattern over the years that those people who carry a lot of insurance coverage tend to be more careless with their insured belongings and make a lot of insurance claims. People I know who carry the absolute minimum insurance tend to take care of their minimally insured items and make almost no claims. They are essentially “self-insured”.
We have had 4 claims in the last year out of our control. Only 1 in the previous 20.
when peters is correct he knocks it out of the park–
at times like this when he is not correct he’s so full of …. that he not only soils himself he soils his readers–
try getting hit by an uninsured motorist when you are in your own beater that you do not carry comp/collision on–
your attitude about this might change as to whether or not people should have to carry liability coverage–and 4 people who are financially self sufficient & don’t want to pay premiums,you can usually post $ w/the state equal to the minimum required coverage to get out of paying premiums–
His point is that they ignore the law, and don’t get penalized…Probably because they are illegals or minorities…
Not really. Spend any amount of time in District Court, and you’ll see many of those interacting with the courts are minorities AND aliens. A disproportionate amount of bench warrants for failure to appear also seem to be nominally hispanic or dindu.
Now in the era of woke, exploring this minority thing is piquing my interest.
Seeing lots of what appears to be minority “privilege”, I’m wondering how to turn this to my advantage.
Mr. Peters, like many of those who post here, do not see that the answers lie plainly in their complaints.
As the CIO of a large Asset Management firm, I would expect a less emotional response from him.
Clearly, the government pays little attention to those that are apparently indigent, and even makes special exceptions for them. Many government fines and fees can be expunged through court or avoided via claims of indigency.
Many blue oriented states that mandate insurance have special programs for those that are unable to afford it. There is no reason not to make use of this, other than to avoid interaction with the government. And if you don’t ask or investigate this, it doesn’t exist.
As for speeding, police stops of brightly colored and/or expensive autos greatly exceeds those of jalopies. Why? Maybe if they can afford the car, they can afford the ticket?
Not the CIO Peters. He’s an automotive guy.
Ooops. My bad.
Two different Eric Peters?
One from One River and one from Eric Peters Autos. Check.
I’ve seen some pretty well known posters here, thought they were the same.
I learned about uninsured motorist insurance the hard way. It also means UNDERinsured motorist. The minimum required coverage in my state is $10k. I got hit on my motorcycle by a minimum insured motorist. Insurance cut me a check for $10K. Too bad my bills were over $15k. My options were to eat $5k or sue the other driver. She didn’t have a pot to piss in.
Live and learn.
But that doesn’t mean she will never have a pot to piss in.
Filing a civil suit pro se is relatively cheap (probably under $50).
If you’ve never done it, there’s a learning curve. Court clerks can be very helpful.
One could file suit, notify, waive mediation, present, and probably win judgement in your favor.
Defendant fails to appear, you win automatically.
Clearly the amount you sued for would be 5K plus compensation for your pain and suffering, and court costs.
The education is worth the time alone.
With judgement, file lien against any tangible property owned, and for wage garnishment.
Says Eric, who I’ll bet does not drive a beater and most likely has his vehicle insured.
Spot on BL. My vehicle is 12 years old and fully insured because I like it that way and sleep easy.
Many moons ago I questioned my insurance company on the requirement for fire insurance. I advised them that in my area the last time of a total loss by fire was in 1525AD. Therefore I requested that I did not want to have fire insurance included in my policy (I would take my own risk) – you can guess the reply.
On another occasion my land was damaged by badgers – they broke down a stone wall and I wanted to claim for damage and restitution. Ah yes they said, of course, but when did it happen? I reported that it had taken several years because my wall was on their run – a gradual degradation. Ah, they said, this is not covered in your ‘policy’ which only provides for a sudden attack and not normal deformation. You can guess my reply.
Parasites all – a scam of immense proportions – insurance is just that – a scam. Well said Eric – I share your disdain.
In the last ten years KY has had numerous wind and hail, flood losses. If your home were a total loss from tornado, would you have the 300/400/500k or more to replace it and replace all your contents? Self insuring is very risky, you better have thick bank but it is your choice if you have no liens against the property.
EDIT: AP, I too hate paying insurance. KY is one of two states that has tax on insurance premiums. Our county has 11% tax….ouch!
Ouch indeed BL!
“Health” insurance is the biggest scam going. If you are healthy, then what are you insuring for?
In my family, we have very little cancer (all smokers), and most deaths were from heart attacks/disease (more preventable by a proper lifestyle).
So at 49, I do not have cancer, lupus, diabetes, high blood pressure, or smoke. Why am I paying 350 bucks a month on a high-deductible insurance policy? Why can’t I just pay out of pocket for general things like a physical or the occasional visit for maybe strep throat and keep “catastrophic” coverage IN CASE I get cancer and need expensive treatment? That’s really what kills the bank account anyway. A visit to the walk-in clinic for a problematic half-ruptured wisdom tooth that once every few years flares up and needs antibiotics costs $320 bucks, meds are another $20. That’s a once in a while cost of $350 versus the monthly $350 I have to pay for something I never use.
Before Romney instituted mandatory “health coverage” for the entire state of MA when he was Lord High Governor, I used to pay $150 bucks a month for just catastrophic coverage and pay for the other stuff out of pocket.
Oh how the trumpets sounded from on high, promising that now LO, everyone would have access to “affordable” health care coverage.
Hey, guess what, the poor were already covered by MassHealth. Now the poor are still covered by MassHealth but now all us working plebes pay more, for less coverage with sky-high deductibles. Thanks. That worked out fanfuckingtastic for no one except the insurance companies.
I rejoin in your frustration realestatepup,- we are captured beasts and only the fleet of foot may just escape the web of intrigue.
Insurance is almost my only bill. In AZ it’s a 900.00 fine for no proof of insurance. I’ve considered how to go without it since I’ve never even made a claim.