mr_matt - I'm not arguing the point that people should take responsibility for their actions. Some people do and some people don't. Then there are those who do the best they can within reason.

From a different perspective, let's say I make $15K/year salary. You make $200K yearly a dollar at time as a Chipendale. I fly a $300 plane and you fly a $10K plane.

One week you shoot me down accidentally. You take responsibility, apologize and hand me over a check for $500.00 just because you feel so gosh darn bad that you think you should go above and beyond.

A month later I show up with my brand new $350 plane (I used the other $150.00 to buy something nice for my wife - thanks ). Sometime later in the day I turn on my transmitter to adjust something and totally forgot to get the pin. Oops. There goes your $10K plane. I know this sounds sarcastic, but for the sake of argument, it was truly an accident. I felt you more than made up for what you did and don't harbor any ill-will towards you.

So now I feel really guilty, but your plane amounts to half a year's salary for me. That's a huge debt I just incurred and will be a much greater financial hardship to me than it was for you when you shot me down. Obviously I can't write you a check.

Now, if I hadn't accepted your check would we be even? After all we both made the same mistake.

Let's say I can pay you $50/month or maybe even $100/month. Be honest now. Would you demand that and feel satisfied? At that rate it would take more than 8 years to pay for your plane. And with my low income, anything that happens to me means I'll miss payments. For example, I get a flat tire or my car breaks down. I lose my job or maybe I just get sick and incur a $20K hospital bill.

I honestly don't know what the courts would do. Our legal system is insanely inconsistent when it comes to what they consider "fair" compensation. To be honest, I don't really care what they decide anyway. If the person who is suing for compensation isn't happy with the judgement then what's the point?

Going back to my previous post. If I spent a year building a model that the court decides is "worth" $500.00 then I'll feel screwed. I think I should be compensated a year's salary assuming the year I spent building the model was about the same number of hours I'd spend at work in a year.

Taking that one step farther, if I make the same $200K that you make would you feel it was right to pay $200K for a mistake that destroyed my toy?

At what point is it too much? If I could somehow build a model worth $2 mil, would you feel you had to pay for it over a simple mistake? Would you actually attempt to do it?

Do we need clubs to cap how expensive of an airplane you can bring to the field? We can have a ghetto club and Jet Set club and all types of clubs in between. That would be maybe a half dozen income level based clubs per region.

My whole point to all of this isn't that a person shouldn't be responsible, but a true mistake shouldn't ruin someone's life or bring undue hardship either. That's unreasonable.