Some people really would say “nah, I’d live/I know how to do it safely, but I can’t afford the fine.”

Reminds me of one of my favorite lines from MASH: “Stop! I’ll have you killed! Then court-marshaled!”

It’s because people are bad at imagining situations they have no reference for, so the brain tends to ignore it, and then reject the situation.

If you say “you might die”, people will almost instinctively say “pfff, no I won’t”.

But if you say “you’ll pay 200 bucks!”, people will have ample comparison with how much that sucks, and will try to avoid the avoid the feelings of suck.