Deaths are often measured in deaths per 100,000,000 miles driven, with a current measurement of 1.18 deaths per 100 million miles[1]. If a car is driving 60 mph

Deaths are often measured in deaths per 100,000,000 miles driven, with a current measurement of 1.18 deaths per 100 million miles[1]. If a car is driving 60 mph 24/7, it takes 190 years for it to drive 100,000,000 miles. Let's assume that, in a decade, 1% of cars are on autopilot. There are 37,000 deaths per year in the USA due to car accidents[1]. Therefore, in order for Tesla/Google/GM to claim that it is equivalent to normal cars, it has to drive 370 * (100 million/1.18) ~= 31,300,000,000 miles, with only 370 accidents. If $COMPANY really had, say, 400 accidents, then it would have to make up the additional miles. In specific, it would have to make up 30 * (100 million/1.18) ~= 2,500,000,000. That means a fleet of (190 * 25) = 4,750 cars driving 24/7 for an entire year. That's not impossible for $COMPANY to do, but it is starting to become unreasonable. What's more likely is that $COMPANY just straight up lies about its incidence rate to regulators. But that's hard to do, considering it's going to be public if someone gets hit by a car. I don't think its possible to fool the regulators, but even if it was possible there are dramatic consequences for lying. Volkswagon tricked regulators into thinking their car didn't emit as much as it really did in 2007-2015, and ended up having to pay 33.3 billion dollars in fines and returns[2]. Volkswagon stock went from a high of around 27 to 12. 5 years later, it's only recovered to around 16. The massive lawsuit that would be formed if Tesla's (or other automated car maker) car was found to be unsafe would likely be even larger. Furthermore, it would crush the self-driving car business semi-permanently. VW at least still gets to make environmentally safe cars, Tesla and Waymo's main value proposition is dead in the water. Basically, even though there are incentives to lie and cheat, I think the incentives to try to make something that is safe is far, far greater. And while I'm sure there are Google cars driving the same route every day, I'm sure there are also tests being done in all sorts of conditions all over the planet. I think that practically, socially, and politically speaking, we can use billions of miles driven. The stakes are way too high to lie. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_self-driving_car_fatalities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_self-driving_car_fatal... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal