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January 08, 2005
I will need a booster seat AND bricks on the pedals
Children under 4 feet 9 inches need a booster.
There are several ironies here, the most poignant being the fact that most families with multiple children (and lower incomes, and I count myself among such families) pass seats and booster seats down to younger sibs for economic reasons. I am inclined to cry "conspiracy" against manufacturers for lobbying such a law into being. Laws that require people to BUY MORE STUFF always make me itch.
A second irony, of course, is the fact that if I were a couple inches shorter, I myself would need a booster seat.
A third irony: officers will now have to carry tape measures along with guns, radios, and other apparatus on their belts.
Maryland passed a similar law recently concerning weight: if a child weighed under 70lbs, they were required to sit in a booster seat. Again, several pounds lighter, *I* would have to sit in one. Things are getting a little ridiculous, in my opinion.
Posted by mryonker at January 8, 2005 08:45 PM
Comments
Another fact about car seats and booster seats-it is illegal to resell them. The idea behind this is a car seat should be thrown out if it is in a car accident and when one is looking at it, one cannot tell it it has been in an accident (unlike bike helmets that become scratched). Downside: you have to pass the carseats around, but you can never sell them to regain any of the $80 you put into each.
Posted by: Mary Ann Steinacker-Grimm at January 11, 2005 09:36 AM
Although I don't doubt that there's something to the "people-must-buy-more-booster-seats" consumption conspiracy, I always thought that these kinds of laws were in (at least in part) a response to lawsuits by folks whose kids have been maimed/killed in an accident (the said maiming and killing being at result of the passenger's small stature). This "foam padding" often seems to come at the expense of the less wealthy (of course, doesn't everything?!)
Posted by: Heather at January 11, 2005 06:25 PM