The latest episode of Everyday Injustice takes on one of the least understood but most destructive aspects of the criminal legal system: fines and fees. Host David Greenwald speaks with Lillian Patil and Tanisha Pire of the Fines and Fees Justice Center about their new report, Imposing Instability: How Court Fines and Fees Destabilize Government Budgets and Criminalize Those Who Cannot Pay. Their research exposes how state and local governments across the country rely on fines and fees not only as a tool of punishment, but also as a hidden and unstable source of revenue.

Patil and Pire explain how fines and fees are imposed at nearly every stage of the system—from traffic tickets and public defender applications to probation supervision—and how this creates what they describe as a “hidden tax” on low-income communities. Over five years, courts in just 24 states imposed nearly $14 billion in fines and fees. Yet much of this debt is uncollectible because the people charged cannot pay, leaving families destabilized and governments still facing budget gaps.

The conversation highlights the human toll: people losing driver’s licenses, facing arrest warrants, being pushed into cycles of debt, and even incarceration because they lacked the ability to pay. As Pire notes, courts rarely conduct ability-to-pay assessments, meaning people are penalized not for their actions but for their poverty. Patil points out that governments often spend more trying to collect this money than they ever receive, making the practice both unjust and fiscally unsound.

Despite these harms, reform has been slow. Some states, like California, have eliminated license suspensions and discharged uncollectible debt, but many continue to depend on fines and fees even as revenues decline. Patil and Pire argue that sustainable, equitable funding must replace this failing system. Their report makes clear that fines and fees are “bad for people, bad for budgets,” and that bold reform is urgently needed.

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