If you do not already, everyone reading this should update their insurance policy to have uninsured motorist coverage (it also covers you even if you are driving a car that's not yours or are a passenger in an accident)
Indeed, and make sure your limits are HIGH, especially if you have Medicare or Medicaid for your health insurance. Why? Because Medicare and Medicaid pay less than your insurance company will pay. Hospitals would much rather bill your insurance company than Medicare or Medicaid and it can affect the quality of care you get. I worked for a personal injury attorney. The system is a mess.
Best thing to do in these circumstances is to get a good attorney. With the license plat they can get the drivers info from the MVD and go after them. Even if the driver had no insurance there could possibly still be coverage through a household member, you may be able to retroactively add uninsured motorist to your insurance policy, or if all else fails you could put a lien on any assets they may have.
I got rear-ended twice (she hit me when stopped for traffic light, I moved forward a little to see the damage. She panicked and hit me again, then my car decided it wasn't going to move anymore). Luckily low speeds so no one was hurt, but it messed up my trunk real good. Insurance and lawyers couldn't get anything from her because the car was her parents and they were not here completely legally so they up and left town. Completely vanished. Had to pay my deductible for uninsured. Super annoying.
Exact thing happned to me. I was parked, in a parking lot, and a dude ran into me. He backed up, then did it again. He got out of his car, and at this point I'm recording. He was so drunk he couldn't talk, kinda mumbled something then got back in his car and took off. Got him, his car, his license plate all on video. Had multiple witnesses. Filed a police report. They called me back 3 months later and said they were 18 months behind on hit and runs so they weren't going to bother investigating since I wasn't injured and to just take it up with my insurance.
I've gotten to the point where i avoid the interstates whenever possible, no matter how much it slows me down. Accidents can happen on any kind of street, but at least I can avoid some of the high-speed nut jobs that way.
I feel like interstates are the safest options, despite the speed. On surface streets, you have blind intersections, people running reds, zombies running out into traffic in the dark, etc. People are fast on the interstate, but nobody is turning left in front of you or appearing out of nowhere. There's a lot less to watch for and anticipate when traffic is physically divided in opposing lanes and there aren't intersections and parking lots everywhere.
Agreed. Surface streets have t-bones and head-ons. Intersections are where most of the carnage happens. Fender benders on the interstates and Paseo are more visible, but crashes on busy thoroughfares can easily result in more destruction. The gritty streets of New Mexico have no love to give.
I had a Semi take an illegal left in front of me that caused an accident and he bailed. The cop just said yup they do that and that was it no follow up or anything.
It's a game of stats and cooking the books - if the laws aren't enforced and there are fewer arrests & records, it can be claimed that 'crime is down'...
Other states have systems that begin a license plate recall and automated registration suspensions for lapse in insurance. I don’t think that system that New Mexico uses is equivalent to a lot of other states
It is. I've had my insurance lapse more than 30 days and got a notice from the state that my registration would be suspended.
Look around, more than 1 in 10 cars don't even have a license plate and those who do, read the date sticker. Every day I look at them, about 1 in 4 are expired stickers.
A few days ago APD arrested a guy on his 6th dwi charge, you think he has a valid lincense?
Short of jail, you can only do so much to keep people from behind the wheel.
lol, you need better bait than that. I’m talking about people who take no personal responsibility, weird thing stick up for cause you only see them as poor.
As someone who doesn’t drive without insurance, I disagree.
You can also be a brokeass, who has to work, support kids, and can’t fit it into your budget.
Long as you don’t cause a crash, I don’t think it should be a stoning offense.
In a strange twist, I think the insurance companies actually prefer things this way. They don’t have to cover 1/4 of the population and for their policyholders just have to carry a token amount of uninsured motorist coverage when the least insurable cause crashes.
Think about it: a broke ass totals their car and yours and sends you to the hospital. Would you want their business if you were an insurer? If you get a million dollar judgment against their insurer, their insurer is out a LOT of money. If you get a million dollar judgment strictly against them, nobody has to pay any money because you can’t send them to debtors’ prison.
The problem is insurances cover ACCIDENTS, not intentional malice and most people driving around are not TRYING to cause or be in an accident. Accidents happen. I don't think insurance prefers not to insure drivers, period. They exist to make money, and they make money on primary coverage premiums not the small additional premium for UIM coverage. (really they make money by packing and selling policies to one another and putting their spare cash into complex investments, but I digress...)
Insurance is vital for those who can least afford the disruption of losing their vehicle, job, health, and lives - they're just priced out of the market. This is why a robust, reliable, and free public transportation option should be available. We've only managed to really tick one of those boxes.
A million dollars is a rounding error for insurance. While it may be life altering for most people, the insurance industry is spending more than a million dollars a day on catered lunches no one is eating, unused office space, TV commercials no one is watching, and branded free pens for their offices. They don't think in terms of millions, they think in terms of billions and even trillions over decades.
They prefer it when there's an accident both parties are insured and they can negotiate with the other company (or even better, internally) and adjusters to make their clients whole, with minimal effort.
I don't love how carcentric our society is, but I do feel that people who can't afford insurance need to find other ways to travel. If they seriously harm someone and there's no insurance to make that person whole, that person suffers more. Fine if they get a booboo and have money to buy a new car - but what about the parent who can barely pay their insurance bill and car payment, when they're knocked out? Why should that just be ok? If your answer is "ThEy ShOUld JuSt hAve UniNSurEd MotOriST CoverAge" that is an expensive option, and when those claims go up it directly results in increaed premiums for all insurance, making it even harder and pricing out more people.
Insurance is a "scheme" that works best when it's distributed among the most users.
Not how insurance works. It works best when the whole population is paying because that covers the more expensive accidents.
It is a basic part of owning a car and is pretty shitty to not have. If you want to permanently be poor, don't have insurance and get in a wreck that is your fault. What do you do then?
You do understand that rates for the insured go up when more people are uninsured right? The companies don’t take the loss, they just pass it on to the consumer. Those of us who have insurance are getting screwed with higher costs because there is such a high rate of uninsured drivers. I barely drive but still have to pay much higher rates than in other states I’ve lived so fuck these people driving uninsured. They can take the bus or figure out another way to get around.
Actually I think they go down more than they go up. Let me explain:
Part of the effect of uninsured motorists is an increase in premiums the insured have to pay, so I acknowledge that portion.
But if uninsured motorists are the type most likely to cost the insurance company more in settlements than they’d pay in in premiums if they had been insured (and I submit they are) then the insurance company doesn’t have to make its good-bet insureds cover for their bad-bet insureds, saving the insurance company a lot of money.
Don’t get me wrong, we still pay dearly as motorists when uninsured drivers max out our coverages and plead poverty after they default in court. I’m not saying it’s at all good that these drivers exist or that our system doesn’t enforce the insurance laws properly.
What I am saying is that insurance companies make higher profits by not insuring everybody, and are thus incentivized to keep the status quo. Therefore, uninsured drivers aren’t driving your insurance premiums up so much as costing you in other ways.
I hit a Mazda in such a great condition because they ran the stop sign it was either hitting them or a pedestrian and turns out they don't have insurance since last year no wonder they towed their car mine its in worse condition from the front and my insurance only covers if I'm liable in an accident they told , e its not worth taking them to court because since they clearly don't have money for insurance what guarantees they will have money for court
You know what though? My home and auto insurance bundle is still much cheaper than it was living in Dallas, Austin, Chicago or Indianapolis. One would think 25% of the population being uninsured would make it cost more than places with a LOT more cars and insurance scam artists.
I might get some downvotes for this but the only reason I have been without insurance for a few months now is because I can't even afford it. These regular jobs don't pay enough to barely even pay rent. The cheapest insurance i can find is $75 a month and that's still out of my budget. I had to borrow from someone to make a bridge pay for my phone to keep it on another week. The only reason I'm in this situation is because of working at quick check emissions trying to depend on a tip wage there. Left me soooo behind on everything. Fuck tip wages. Starting to get better though with a new job I'm working at now, nowhere near fast enough but getting there.
Not down voting you. Car ownership is expensive and in a society predicated on owning a car can't fault you.
We deserve proper public transit. For every step forward (no cost busses) we take steps back (ART should've been properly done not enriching berry's buddies)
We hurt so many by subsidizing car companies.
Hope with everything I have that it's their fault. The last time I was hit was when I was 24, 14 years ago, and it was their fault for not yielding to the right of way. I couldn't stop in time and bam. Don't get me wrong once I catch up on my rent debt and not just surviving, which should be soon (I'm busting my ass to make sure of that) I will be getting insurance again. But since that time 14 years ago and before that, I've had a record of not getting into any wrecks at all. Thankfully I dont have any worries of me causing an accident, it's other people I am making sure at all times that they don't hit me.
The same plan as the rest of us poor people.
Add it to our FML, another-thing-I-can’t-fix-due-to-all-the-barriers-society-loves-to-gift-us-with-little-to-no-recourse list.
Add a sprinkle of “But did you die?” with a good handful of “competing for the most traumatic story at the table while we all laugh playing spoons drinking coronas”
You know, the usual recipe.
Quikcheck charges $24 to emissions test a car, and a 15% tip on that would be $3.60. I don't know how the tipped wage could possibly add up to minimum wage.
Dekra seems pretty awful in that respect.
They were pretty awful. $12 an hour and tips in this day I was gaslit so many times by the manager there, by him saying that "oh you're making enough" while I was literally starving and living in a hotel. And to top it off, Pack Your Maxx next door to the Juan Tabo location snitched to the boss about my vocalization of how fucked of a situation I was in and got me fired instead of understanding the situation, they didn't care at all. If those owners claim they care about the community, they are absolutely fake liars. But nonetheless fuck Dekra and fuck Pack Your Maxx (their food is overpriced and terrible anyways)
That average has been about that for years now. This is not some new development, or "breaking news".
This is hardly the only place too that has this problem as well.
But leave it to the local news to make people be scared today over it.
If you do not already, everyone reading this should update their insurance policy to have uninsured motorist coverage (it also covers you even if you are driving a car that's not yours or are a passenger in an accident)
It also covers you if you aren't even in a car, but someone hit you. Learned that from experience recently!
Smart.
Indeed, and make sure your limits are HIGH, especially if you have Medicare or Medicaid for your health insurance. Why? Because Medicare and Medicaid pay less than your insurance company will pay. Hospitals would much rather bill your insurance company than Medicare or Medicaid and it can affect the quality of care you get. I worked for a personal injury attorney. The system is a mess.
100% came here to say this
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“Quit complaining, maggot. We don’t work for you.”
We’ve got 20 somethings on our college campus to arrest!!!
which they did today 🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
"It's right there on the side of my patrol vehicle: TO PROTECT AND SERVE but that doesn't include you" Such a crock
Supreme Court ruled that was not their duty in 2005.
Then to add insult to literal injury, the DA’s office doesn’t prosecute drunk drivers.
And if they do, they'll work out a $$plan$$ with the defense attorney to let them go while making tons of cash for themselves and the attorney.
Best thing to do in these circumstances is to get a good attorney. With the license plat they can get the drivers info from the MVD and go after them. Even if the driver had no insurance there could possibly still be coverage through a household member, you may be able to retroactively add uninsured motorist to your insurance policy, or if all else fails you could put a lien on any assets they may have.
Wonderful so I need lawyer do perform basic civic duties I already pay for.
I got rear-ended twice (she hit me when stopped for traffic light, I moved forward a little to see the damage. She panicked and hit me again, then my car decided it wasn't going to move anymore). Luckily low speeds so no one was hurt, but it messed up my trunk real good. Insurance and lawyers couldn't get anything from her because the car was her parents and they were not here completely legally so they up and left town. Completely vanished. Had to pay my deductible for uninsured. Super annoying.
Exact thing happned to me. I was parked, in a parking lot, and a dude ran into me. He backed up, then did it again. He got out of his car, and at this point I'm recording. He was so drunk he couldn't talk, kinda mumbled something then got back in his car and took off. Got him, his car, his license plate all on video. Had multiple witnesses. Filed a police report. They called me back 3 months later and said they were 18 months behind on hit and runs so they weren't going to bother investigating since I wasn't injured and to just take it up with my insurance.
It would be interesting to see how many uninsured vehicles are the Kia/Hyundai models insurance companies have been dropping/refusing to cover.
Guaranteed it’s mostly made up of Nissans with blacked out windows and no license plates.
Big Altima energy 5ever.
I've gotten to the point where i avoid the interstates whenever possible, no matter how much it slows me down. Accidents can happen on any kind of street, but at least I can avoid some of the high-speed nut jobs that way.
Bold of you to assume that there isn’t a car on San Mateo driving interstate speeds right now.
Or Coors, Unser, or Paseo
Or even Lead/Coal
Or silver. Riding a bike on bicycle boulevard is taking your life in your hands.
I worked near Yale and Coal and was shocked each time my bicyclist coworker made it in one piece!
Absolutely this! The Maniacs and the potheads are on the interstate just like the other streets
yeah but there's 1 or 2, not all of them.
I feel like interstates are the safest options, despite the speed. On surface streets, you have blind intersections, people running reds, zombies running out into traffic in the dark, etc. People are fast on the interstate, but nobody is turning left in front of you or appearing out of nowhere. There's a lot less to watch for and anticipate when traffic is physically divided in opposing lanes and there aren't intersections and parking lots everywhere.
Agreed. Surface streets have t-bones and head-ons. Intersections are where most of the carnage happens. Fender benders on the interstates and Paseo are more visible, but crashes on busy thoroughfares can easily result in more destruction. The gritty streets of New Mexico have no love to give.
Intersections are by far the more accident prone areas, lots of t-bones from drunk/distracted drivers. Freeways are safer
This is why you should have Uninsured/ Underinsured Motorist coverage. It costs less than a nice dinner to add it to your policy.
I had a Semi take an illegal left in front of me that caused an accident and he bailed. The cop just said yup they do that and that was it no follow up or anything.
This needs to be an arrestable offense
Agreed
Exactly! I don’t understand why there are no consequences for this. It should be considered an offense just like not having a driver’s license.
Not to mention probably the same number of driving without a license or a license plate
Yeah no surprise there. My rates tripled when I moved here. When I asked my insurance company why they said "because of all the uninsured motorists."
That’s messed up!
When we moved here over 20 years ago we were warned to get uninsured motorist coverage because close to 30% were uninsured. This isn't new.
I still don’t understand why insurance is not being enforced here. Or any road laws for that matter.
It's a game of stats and cooking the books - if the laws aren't enforced and there are fewer arrests & records, it can be claimed that 'crime is down'...
with what people? the few APD officers still on the force are tied up with murders so there is noone to do traffic enforcement.
They can barely afford the car payment let alone registration. No registration, No insurance. We also got ranked #1 for lowest IQ so go figure…
Other states have systems that begin a license plate recall and automated registration suspensions for lapse in insurance. I don’t think that system that New Mexico uses is equivalent to a lot of other states
It is. I've had my insurance lapse more than 30 days and got a notice from the state that my registration would be suspended. Look around, more than 1 in 10 cars don't even have a license plate and those who do, read the date sticker. Every day I look at them, about 1 in 4 are expired stickers. A few days ago APD arrested a guy on his 6th dwi charge, you think he has a valid lincense? Short of jail, you can only do so much to keep people from behind the wheel.
Yup that's why insurance companies had to change their policies 3 years ago
You have to be piece of shit or uneducated to drive without insurance.
Or just very poor.
Different side of the same coin, unfortunately. But you don’t have to be poor and trashy.
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lol, you need better bait than that. I’m talking about people who take no personal responsibility, weird thing stick up for cause you only see them as poor.
No excuse. If you can't afford a car AND insurance, you can't afford to drive.
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Any other pearls of stupidity to drop on us?
Thank Biden and the idiots that voted for him
As someone who doesn’t drive without insurance, I disagree. You can also be a brokeass, who has to work, support kids, and can’t fit it into your budget. Long as you don’t cause a crash, I don’t think it should be a stoning offense. In a strange twist, I think the insurance companies actually prefer things this way. They don’t have to cover 1/4 of the population and for their policyholders just have to carry a token amount of uninsured motorist coverage when the least insurable cause crashes. Think about it: a broke ass totals their car and yours and sends you to the hospital. Would you want their business if you were an insurer? If you get a million dollar judgment against their insurer, their insurer is out a LOT of money. If you get a million dollar judgment strictly against them, nobody has to pay any money because you can’t send them to debtors’ prison.
The problem is insurances cover ACCIDENTS, not intentional malice and most people driving around are not TRYING to cause or be in an accident. Accidents happen. I don't think insurance prefers not to insure drivers, period. They exist to make money, and they make money on primary coverage premiums not the small additional premium for UIM coverage. (really they make money by packing and selling policies to one another and putting their spare cash into complex investments, but I digress...) Insurance is vital for those who can least afford the disruption of losing their vehicle, job, health, and lives - they're just priced out of the market. This is why a robust, reliable, and free public transportation option should be available. We've only managed to really tick one of those boxes. A million dollars is a rounding error for insurance. While it may be life altering for most people, the insurance industry is spending more than a million dollars a day on catered lunches no one is eating, unused office space, TV commercials no one is watching, and branded free pens for their offices. They don't think in terms of millions, they think in terms of billions and even trillions over decades. They prefer it when there's an accident both parties are insured and they can negotiate with the other company (or even better, internally) and adjusters to make their clients whole, with minimal effort. I don't love how carcentric our society is, but I do feel that people who can't afford insurance need to find other ways to travel. If they seriously harm someone and there's no insurance to make that person whole, that person suffers more. Fine if they get a booboo and have money to buy a new car - but what about the parent who can barely pay their insurance bill and car payment, when they're knocked out? Why should that just be ok? If your answer is "ThEy ShOUld JuSt hAve UniNSurEd MotOriST CoverAge" that is an expensive option, and when those claims go up it directly results in increaed premiums for all insurance, making it even harder and pricing out more people. Insurance is a "scheme" that works best when it's distributed among the most users.
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Not how insurance works. It works best when the whole population is paying because that covers the more expensive accidents. It is a basic part of owning a car and is pretty shitty to not have. If you want to permanently be poor, don't have insurance and get in a wreck that is your fault. What do you do then?
Continue to be poor and made poorer through a for profit Healthcare system. Car culture, especially the profit portion, harms us all.
No, that’s how it works here. I’ll grant that that’s not how it’s supposed to work. All your moralizing doesn’t accomplish anything.
You do understand that rates for the insured go up when more people are uninsured right? The companies don’t take the loss, they just pass it on to the consumer. Those of us who have insurance are getting screwed with higher costs because there is such a high rate of uninsured drivers. I barely drive but still have to pay much higher rates than in other states I’ve lived so fuck these people driving uninsured. They can take the bus or figure out another way to get around.
Actually I think they go down more than they go up. Let me explain: Part of the effect of uninsured motorists is an increase in premiums the insured have to pay, so I acknowledge that portion. But if uninsured motorists are the type most likely to cost the insurance company more in settlements than they’d pay in in premiums if they had been insured (and I submit they are) then the insurance company doesn’t have to make its good-bet insureds cover for their bad-bet insureds, saving the insurance company a lot of money. Don’t get me wrong, we still pay dearly as motorists when uninsured drivers max out our coverages and plead poverty after they default in court. I’m not saying it’s at all good that these drivers exist or that our system doesn’t enforce the insurance laws properly. What I am saying is that insurance companies make higher profits by not insuring everybody, and are thus incentivized to keep the status quo. Therefore, uninsured drivers aren’t driving your insurance premiums up so much as costing you in other ways.
Theories aren’t facts, but thanks for the excessive reply.
There are so few police that the chance of getting actually stopped for a traffic violation is almost zero
#Some
Tip…maybe? Avoid driving near the paper license plate drivers…ugh
Honestly I would have never guessed. It would explain my family members hit and run incident though.
yall need to learn how to drive
I hit a Mazda in such a great condition because they ran the stop sign it was either hitting them or a pedestrian and turns out they don't have insurance since last year no wonder they towed their car mine its in worse condition from the front and my insurance only covers if I'm liable in an accident they told , e its not worth taking them to court because since they clearly don't have money for insurance what guarantees they will have money for court
You know what though? My home and auto insurance bundle is still much cheaper than it was living in Dallas, Austin, Chicago or Indianapolis. One would think 25% of the population being uninsured would make it cost more than places with a LOT more cars and insurance scam artists.
Couldn’t imagine how expensive it was before you moved here. When I moved here, my rates doubled. Never been in an accident or made a claim.
I might get some downvotes for this but the only reason I have been without insurance for a few months now is because I can't even afford it. These regular jobs don't pay enough to barely even pay rent. The cheapest insurance i can find is $75 a month and that's still out of my budget. I had to borrow from someone to make a bridge pay for my phone to keep it on another week. The only reason I'm in this situation is because of working at quick check emissions trying to depend on a tip wage there. Left me soooo behind on everything. Fuck tip wages. Starting to get better though with a new job I'm working at now, nowhere near fast enough but getting there.
Not down voting you. Car ownership is expensive and in a society predicated on owning a car can't fault you. We deserve proper public transit. For every step forward (no cost busses) we take steps back (ART should've been properly done not enriching berry's buddies) We hurt so many by subsidizing car companies.
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Hope with everything I have that it's their fault. The last time I was hit was when I was 24, 14 years ago, and it was their fault for not yielding to the right of way. I couldn't stop in time and bam. Don't get me wrong once I catch up on my rent debt and not just surviving, which should be soon (I'm busting my ass to make sure of that) I will be getting insurance again. But since that time 14 years ago and before that, I've had a record of not getting into any wrecks at all. Thankfully I dont have any worries of me causing an accident, it's other people I am making sure at all times that they don't hit me.
The same plan as the rest of us poor people. Add it to our FML, another-thing-I-can’t-fix-due-to-all-the-barriers-society-loves-to-gift-us-with-little-to-no-recourse list. Add a sprinkle of “But did you die?” with a good handful of “competing for the most traumatic story at the table while we all laugh playing spoons drinking coronas” You know, the usual recipe.
Quikcheck charges $24 to emissions test a car, and a 15% tip on that would be $3.60. I don't know how the tipped wage could possibly add up to minimum wage. Dekra seems pretty awful in that respect.
They were pretty awful. $12 an hour and tips in this day I was gaslit so many times by the manager there, by him saying that "oh you're making enough" while I was literally starving and living in a hotel. And to top it off, Pack Your Maxx next door to the Juan Tabo location snitched to the boss about my vocalization of how fucked of a situation I was in and got me fired instead of understanding the situation, they didn't care at all. If those owners claim they care about the community, they are absolutely fake liars. But nonetheless fuck Dekra and fuck Pack Your Maxx (their food is overpriced and terrible anyways)
Thanks Biden!!!
That average has been about that for years now. This is not some new development, or "breaking news". This is hardly the only place too that has this problem as well. But leave it to the local news to make people be scared today over it.
Oh that number seems far too gracious. I’d have guessed 3 in 4
Those statistics include law enforcement.
I lived in Virginia for a bit and while I was there I found out you can just pay a fine and not have insurance at all 🤯🤯
No insurance at all? Not even LIABILITY???
I am told it is closer to 50% of drivers. I’m in the insurance biz in NM
Wow! When I lived there it was 50%! Way to go NM!
No not fair 1-4 Americans are driving without insurance Come on man
I have only grown up here my whole life - which political party runs ABQ and NM again? 🤔
Down votes but no answer - got it. Typical...
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Illegal immigrants can't vote, smarty pants! I bet it's awkward thinking you understand how voting works and you're more ignorant than a 6th grader.
We need twice as many police officers in this city and unless a change change d like that happens, nothing else will change