--- title: John Oliver Takes on Municipal Violations on Last Week Tonight description: "If you don't have enough money to pay a fine immediately, tickets can wreck your life" canonical: https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/ author: Laura Stampler article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-23T14:25:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:17:54.424Z og:title: Watch John Oliver Take Down Crippling Fines on Municipal Violations We All Make og:description: "If you don't have enough money to pay a fine immediately, tickets can wreck your life" og:url: https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc8ef647cb9e40624/698784b22dce01a6769de26d/screen-shot-2015-03-23-at-9-47-03-am.png?branch=production&width=814&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 814 og:image:height: 458 og:image:alt: Screen Shot 2015-03-23 at 9.47.03 AM og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Watch John Oliver Take Down Crippling Fines on Municipal Violations We All Make twitter:description: "If you don't have enough money to pay a fine immediately, tickets can wreck your life" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc8ef647cb9e40624/698784b22dce01a6769de26d/screen-shot-2015-03-23-at-9-47-03-am.png?branch=production&width=814&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Watch John Oliver Take Down Crippling Fines on Municipal Violations We All Make > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Mar 23, 2015 2:25 PM UTC  by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Mar 23, 2015 2:25 PM UTC John Oliver’s latest takedown on [Sunday’s episode of _Last Week Tonight_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjpmT5noto) was something most people can relate to—municipal violations like traffic tickets or loitering. “We have all committed municipal violations,” Oliver said. “And if you’ve never gotten a ticket for one, congratulations on not getting caught.” But while a municipal violation is just an annoyance to the wealthy, Oliver said, “if you don’t have enough money to pay a fine immediately, tickets can wreck your life.” Oliver targeted the often exorbitant surcharges, processing and court fees tacked onto relatively minor municipal violations, which can be crippling to impoverished communities. Minimum wage workers can’t always immediately pay off a marked-up $225 ticket, which Oliver noted can take 35 hours to pay off. This only leads to additional fees. If those aren’t paid, the result can be jail time. “We cannot have a system where committing a minor violation can end up putting you in—and I’m going to use a legal term of art here—the f–k barrel,” Oliver said. “We can’t have that. And it might be time that we all stood up and said so.” Watch the full clip below: ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/"},"headline":"Watch John Oliver Take Down Crippling Fines on Municipal Violations We All Make","datePublished":"2015-03-23T14:25:02.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:17:54.424Z","description":"\"If you don't have enough money to pay a fine immediately, tickets can wreck your life\"","url":"https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/","keywords":["Newsfeed","viral","John Oliver","Last Week Tonight"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc8ef647cb9e40624/698784b22dce01a6769de26d/screen-shot-2015-03-23-at-9-47-03-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Laura Stampler","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc8ef647cb9e40624/698784b22dce01a6769de26d/screen-shot-2015-03-23-at-9-47-03-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2015-03-23 at 9.47.03 AM","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3754023/john-oliver-municipal-violations/","name":"Watch John Oliver Take Down Crippling Fines on Municipal Violations We All Make"}}]}] ```