I know less than 93 people and several already were killed in car accidents so that means I’m safe. Thanks statistics!
That’s why I always bring a bomb with myself when flying on a plane - very low odds to have two on boad
K
This is a statistical fact that has basically no bearing on most individuals.
Risk of death in a motor vehicle crash is affected by a ton of factors, most of them within your control.
For example I live in a walkable city and I pay attention at crosswalks. When I drive, it’s mostly daytime highway driving in a well-maintained vehicle with the driver (me) not impaired. All this alone reduces my risk by orders of magnitude.
At the same time there are people who are out there drunk driving on 2-lane roads and highways every weekend.
Railway passenger: Too few deaths in 2022 to calculate odds
But every suburbanite i know says the metro is too dangerous and that you’re likely to get stabbed by a methed up homeless man.
I know people like this and it makes me roll my eyes for sure. But let’s not pretend that the subways/metros/whatever are fine. I contend with a lot of unpleasant stuff every day and I would say have to move cars a couple times a month because someone is scaring me or there’s an odor too offensive for real life.
It’s system dependent but yeah, I’m not gonna argue that metro cars are always the most sanitary.
As for someone scaring you, I’d say that’s a feature not a bug of the metro. It’s not like there are less crazy or dangerous people driving then on the metro, it’s just you don’t see them. If someone’s yelling slurs and nonsense on the metro you can hear / see that and change cars like you said. If they’re doing that in a car there’s no way for you to know about it and avoid them. Maybe you notice them driving eradically but your focused on so many other things it’s easy for it to go under your radar.
Also on the metro that crazy person may have a weapon but on the road it’s guaranteed that that person is in control of a vehicle that can kill dozens of people with a turn of a wheel or the press of a pedal.
Road rage exists but I’ve never seen people intentionally ram each other on the streets.
I see people start fights on the subway maybe once or twice a year. Real terrible stuff. I think most of us can avoid it by having city smarts, but not everyone, and I still have to be scared by it.
It’s not the same. A subset of people are way worse when trapped in a room with other people. Remember that car driving also filters out a lot of the most distressed and mentally ill people, in an expensive city.
A lot of people have opinions on transit without using it a lot. Not saying that’s you but I find that the realities elude a lot of online discussers. Also probably way different in Europe and East Asia than the US sadly.
Either you die, or you don’t. That’s a 50% chance! So, if you’re feeling lucky, there’s no way you can lose!
I wonder what are the odds for someone over 30 who has driving experience and training?
I ask because for motorcycles the first and second year riders make up most of the deaths
Curious if the 1:3162 figure for bicycle deaths is significantly higher in the US than other nations. I guess that depends on whether or not people who die on bikes tend to be hit by cars.
Might actually be lower in the u.s. since no one’s bicycling any way. Even if deaths per mile cycled is significantly higher in the u.s. , if the total miles cycled is low then deaths will be low.
What are the chances I will die of a motor vehicle crash outside of my lifetime?
zero
But what about being in an accident after I’m already caput? Hmm? What about then?
A midsized college football stadium might hold about 70,000 people. Imagine going onto the loudspeaker and announcing “Seven hundred and fifty-three of the people here today are going to die in a car crash. Enjoy the game”
Not sure how Motorcyclist is different from Motor-vehicle crash.
Crazy that it’s more dangerous to be a pedestrian than a Motorcyclist. Are the pedestrian deaths not being counted as a motor-vehicle crash? I doubt that many people are dying from two pedestrians running into each other.
They made the distinction likely because it’s clearer that way as a statistic, as the severity of the crash is very distinct between that two mode of transport.
Also, it’s that low compared to pedestrian because the scale of it. In US commuting via motorcycle is around(or below) 5% according to a quick google search. Compared to country like Malaysia, where there’s equal amount of car and motorcycle on the road, it tell a different story. 6443 road death has been recorded in 2023, and of that 65% is motorcyclist.
Also the pedestrian incident meant pedestrian hit by motor-vehicle. Motor-vehicle crash mean car with car crashes, or hitting a tree.
I’d guess it’s because they aren’t saying “all motorcyclists have a 1 in 722 chance of dying riding a motorcycle” they are saying “1 in 722 Americans will die in a motorcycle crash” while completely disregarding that only (making this number up) 80 of those 722 ever even rode motorcycles in the first place.
In other words, pedestrian deaths simply outnumber fatal motorcycle accidents because there are a lot more pedestrians than motorcyclists.
Which is still lower than the chance that you’ll commit suicide. Or just simply die from a fall…or just from catching COVID.
So yeah. Pretty safe.
I’d take slight issue with this. Having untreated depression and working at heights are also dangerous but driving is by no means safe. As @brotundspiele pointed out driving is safer in most other developed countries than it is in the USA. Simple behaviour and policy changes can make it substantially safer and the fact that drivers don’t take the danger of driving seriously is a huge factor making it more dangerous.
Since you brought it up, let’s dive into the numbers as presented[1]. The top all-cause is heat disease. A disease that’s preventable by moderate exercise (e.g. walking, biking, playing baseball, anything really) and avoiding common legal drugs (tobacco and alcohol being most implicated, but also most available).
Next up, cancer. Also a general class of disease that has many causes, but has also been shown that moderate exercise reduces cancer risk.
COVID and respiratory disease? Preventive measures like vaccines and, again, moderate exercise also reduce this risk. Oh, and cars are a factor in this category (long-term inhaling tailpipe emissions will make your lungs unhealthy).
Opioid overdose (1:55)? Suicide (1:87)? That’s somewhat self explanatory to fix, but good medical care and moderate exercise again helps.
Guns? That’s all cases of guns. Homicide (1:219) and suicide (1:159) by guns must be rolled up to get to the 1:89 figure. Homicide is a big issue to untangle, like suicide. That said, homicide has been linked to car infrastructure depressing local economies and as a tool in segregating black communities into unfit areas away from economically viable white ones.
Then we’re finally down to falls (1:92) and cars (1:93).
What can we take away from this? If you’re trying to reduce risk, go for a walk or ride a bike regularly. It’ll help you avoid heart disease, improve odds against respiratory diseases, and is a good tool for upping your mental health game. No need to trust me. I’m a dog with a keyboard. Talk to your doctor about it. You may be surprised how effective reducing drinking, stopping smoking, and going out for a walk every day can do.
Whoops, my bad. Pedestrian “incidents” (ran over by car) is the next cause (1:468). Cycling isn’t too far behind (1:3,162). Maybe we should continue to drive overhead bad parts of town, inhale our neighbor’s car fumes, and enjoy our near-guaranteed death by heart attack and choking.
[1] In the OP’s data source. It’s a good source, but it is US biased and biased in NHTSA’s reporting (e.g. person in hospital from a car, but died >30 days later? That’s natural causes.).
In Germany in comparison the chances to die in any traffic accident (car or no car) is 1 in 351. So year. Pretty much safer.
TIL There’s a category in the German death statistics named “Resulting from the insertion of a foreign object into a natural body opening.” And I’m only mildly disturbed. That killed 775 People in 2023 btw.
Does the insertion category include choking, or just…other things…?
It’s further divided into
- T15 Foreign object in the outer eye
- T16 … in the ear
- T17 … in the respiratory tract
- T18 … in the digestive tract
- T19 … in the urogenital tract
so it’s the whole package.
How perfectly normal
