$290,000 Speeding Ticket

How fast do you have to drive to get a $290,000 speeding ticket in Switzerland? If you are a Swiss millionaire the answer is 85mph in a 50. A Swiss court determined this record speeding ticket according to the millionaire's $22.7 million net worth and numerous repeat offenses. This story begs the question: should the rich face higher monetary penalties for their violations?

I found this story funny because I was recently driving with a friend of mine who is a lot more wealthy than myself. On the side of the road there was an electronic sign flashing the message "THE PENALTY FOR SPEEDING IS $100" As we passed it my friend laughed, accelerated, and said he would gladly pay $100 to speed home. As a broke college student, $100 is certainly enough of a consequence for me to not take the risk but what about those rich enough to cruise by unphased?

Life's daily decisions are based on managing scarcity through marginal costs and benefits. The marginal benefit of speeding is the time saved with each mile per hour increase in speed while the increasing monetary penalty for every mile per hour driven over the speed limit is the marginal cost.
Although it seems downright unamerican to impose more severe penalties on the rich we should also consider the proportion of their marginal costs to marginal benefits. Because the wealthy have an abundance of money, each minute is comparatively more scarce in the balance of time vs. money that is the logic of speeding. Lets say my bank balance is $1,000 while my friends is $10,000. Although our marginal benefits are the same, our marginal costs are different. In terms of percentage of wealth my friend's marginal cost of speeding is ten times lower than my own so it is therefore ten times more worth it to speed. However, if we both drive recklessly and crash our cars do they not do an equal amount of damage?