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> The things you do for fun almost certainly has an externality as well. About 45k people died in car accidents in the US in 2022, which if treated as it’s own

by RC_ITR 3y ago

> The things you do for fun almost certainly has an externality as well. About 45k people died in car accidents in the US in 2022, which if treated as it’s own category outside of accidents would be just outside the top 10 in causes of death. 2x more death than firearms. Lots of things have externalities, very few things have as severe externalities as cars. Said differently, go to a sporting event of 30k people. Statistically, five of them will die in a car accident this year (45k/300mn =0.015% or about 1 in 6500). Edit: I guess it’s not fashionable to cite statistics on here. I get it, the drivers won the debate a long time ago, but at least articulate why your disagreement with words.

kortilla 3y ago
It’s not fashionable to cite irrelevant statistics. How many of those car crashes you cited were due to 60 year old cars?
lelanthran 3y ago
> About 45k people died in car accidents in the US in 2022, which if treated as it’s own category outside of accidents would be just outside the top 10 in causes of death. 2x more death than firearms. > Lots of things have externalities, very few things have as severe externalities as cars. > Said differently, go to a sporting event of 30k people. Statistically, five of them will die in a car accident this year (45k/300mn =0.015% or about 1 in 6500). > Edit: I guess it’s not fashionable to cite statistics on here. I get it, the drivers won the debate a long time ago, but at least articulate why your disagreement with words. You're being downvoted because you are attempting to mislead with statistics. The numbers for 2017 (prior to the pandemic, which skews the numbers) are from https://www.healthline.com/health/leading-causes-of-death#heart-disease https://www.healthline.com/health/leading-causes-of-death#he.... They don't separate out vehicle accidents, so I'll use your 45k number. 1. The leading cause of deaths is heart disease, more common amongst people who smoke (very few) and obese people (very many) = 635k people, or about 14x more people die due to heart disease than motor vehicle accidents. 2. Accidental deaths = 161k. IOW, you're 3.5x more likely to die from a non-vehicle accident than from a vehicle accident. You know which type of deaths match the numbers for auto accidents? Suicides! All-in-all, that 45k number you give is almost statistical noise: vehicles account for a mere 1.8% of deaths in the US.
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  >You're being downvoted because you are attempting to mislead with statistics. How?[0] Your implication is that 100% of deaths are preventable and the 2% of those deaths that are car accidents are therefore unimportant? It's inherently misleading to look at deaths as a % vs. absolute figures (since we all die eventually). People have to die from disease, it's the human condition. People do not have to die in car accidents (or suicides, we should prevent those too, but that's not really a hobby/activity). The other way in which equating heart disease death with car accident death (or suicide death!) is extremely misleading is that the heart disease victim age chart does not look like this [1] even remotely. People lose a lot of years of life to car crashes. [0]https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/traffic-crash-death-estimates-2022#:~:text=The%20National%20Highway%20Traffic%20Safety,42%2C939%20fatalities%20reported%20for%202021 https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/traffic-crash-death-est.... [1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/motor-vehicle/historical-fatality-trends/deaths-by-age-group/ https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/motor-vehicle/historical-fatalit...
  - naveen99 3y ago
    How much time is saved using a car vs walking ? What are the efficiency gains ? You should quantify the benefits as well as the risks.
graton 3y ago
Probably most people have about a 1 in 80 chance of dying each year on average over the course of their life. The US death rate is 1.04% per year. So in that sporting event example, statistically 313 of them will die within a year's time. Also if the sporting event was today then only around 2.5 people would die in a car accident "this year" as currently we are already in July ;) Anyway that is my bunch of nonsense statistics :)
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  >The US death rate is 1.04% per year. So in that sporting event example, statistically 313 of them will die within a year's time. Yeah but only some of those deaths are randomly distributed across the population and not correlated with age. Car accidents being a major example of that (unless there's a bunch of 70+ year olds at Yankees games that I'm not seeing).
  - graton 3y ago
    Could also say the same thing about car accidents. The death rates for car accidents is different based on gender. What is the gender ratio at those Yankees games? :) I'm willing to hand-wave over a lot of this stuff as otherwise it gets way too overcome with pedantry which likely doesn't matter...
darkclouds 3y ago
[flagged]
thworp 3y ago
I half agree with you, but if we're only talking about death and accident prevention it would be worth it to look at other highly developed countries that have much lower accident rates (there are quite a few that have much lower numbers, both per capita and per mile). Of course, copying these countries will take time, especially because half the problem is the terrible drivers education and lax enforcement which precludes quite a few measures. Things that could be done right now are: * designing roads to calm traffic (bends and such): highly effective at reducing pedestrian/cyclist accidents * building proper separated bike paths * mandatory inspections in all states. a non-negligible % of accidents are caused by defective vehicles * mandating and actually enforcing minimum following distance on highways * banning modifications like steel plate grills (basically a human-crushing ram) * scrapping the entire tax and regulation scheme that lead to the size wars in trucks and SUVs Then there are things like replacing more STOP signs with YIELD, roundabouts, giving bike paths green lights together with turning traffic (requires drivers to look in their blindspot and yield) and lane discipline. Those broadly reduce frustration and fatigue which helps people stay calm.
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  > half agree with you, but if we're only talking about death and accident prevention it would be worth it to look at other highly developed countries that have much lower accident rates (there are quite a few that have much lower numbers, both per capita and per mile). We live in an interesting time where it's an instinct to say 'Sure 45k people die each year from this, but how does that benchmark?' Even if Germany had a 40x higher/lower rate than the US, why does it matter when people are still needlessly dying?
  - thworp 3y ago
    First, I meant that as a suggestion to look at comparable countries and look at what they're doing because it has been proven it will work. That is as opposed to different measure which might work but have side effects. That leads me to the heart of your comment. Sure you could institute some kind of dystopian dictatorship that makes sure nobody dies of the causes we deem preventable now. But it would be a cure that kills the patient (free society). So, there are always trade offs. What I was saying is that looking at other countries and what they've done you can see the trade offs in advance and decide if they're worth it.
ot1138 3y ago
[flagged]

by RC_ITR 3y ago

kortilla 3y ago

It’s not fashionable to cite irrelevant statistics. How many of those car crashes you cited were due to 60 year old cars?

lelanthran 3y ago

> About 45k people died in car accidents in the US in 2022, which if treated as it’s own category outside of accidents would be just outside the top 10 in causes of death. 2x more death than firearms. > Lots of things have externalities, very few things have as severe externalities as cars. > Said differently, go to a sporting event of 30k people. Statistically, five of them will die in a car accident this year (45k/300mn =0.015% or about 1 in 6500). > Edit: I guess it’s not fashionable to cite statistics on here. I get it, the drivers won the debate a long time ago, but at least articulate why your disagreement with words. You're being downvoted because you are attempting to mislead with statistics. The numbers for 2017 (prior to the pandemic, which skews the numbers) are from https://www.healthline.com/health/leading-causes-of-death#heart-disease https://www.healthline.com/health/leading-causes-of-death#he.... They don't separate out vehicle accidents, so I'll use your 45k number. 1. The leading cause of deaths is heart disease, more common amongst people who smoke (very few) and obese people (very many) = 635k people, or about 14x more people die due to heart disease than motor vehicle accidents. 2. Accidental deaths = 161k. IOW, you're 3.5x more likely to die from a non-vehicle accident than from a vehicle accident. You know which type of deaths match the numbers for auto accidents? Suicides! All-in-all, that 45k number you give is almost statistical noise: vehicles account for a mere 1.8% of deaths in the US.

RC_ITR 3y ago
>You're being downvoted because you are attempting to mislead with statistics. How?[0] Your implication is that 100% of deaths are preventable and the 2% of those deaths that are car accidents are therefore unimportant? It's inherently misleading to look at deaths as a % vs. absolute figures (since we all die eventually). People have to die from disease, it's the human condition. People do not have to die in car accidents (or suicides, we should prevent those too, but that's not really a hobby/activity). The other way in which equating heart disease death with car accident death (or suicide death!) is extremely misleading is that the heart disease victim age chart does not look like this [1] even remotely. People lose a lot of years of life to car crashes. [0]https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/traffic-crash-death-estimates-2022#:~:text=The%20National%20Highway%20Traffic%20Safety,42%2C939%20fatalities%20reported%20for%202021 https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/traffic-crash-death-est.... [1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/motor-vehicle/historical-fatality-trends/deaths-by-age-group/ https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/motor-vehicle/historical-fatalit...
- naveen99 3y ago
  How much time is saved using a car vs walking ? What are the efficiency gains ? You should quantify the benefits as well as the risks.

graton 3y ago

Probably most people have about a 1 in 80 chance of dying each year on average over the course of their life. The US death rate is 1.04% per year. So in that sporting event example, statistically 313 of them will die within a year's time. Also if the sporting event was today then only around 2.5 people would die in a car accident "this year" as currently we are already in July ;) Anyway that is my bunch of nonsense statistics :)

RC_ITR 3y ago
>The US death rate is 1.04% per year. So in that sporting event example, statistically 313 of them will die within a year's time. Yeah but only some of those deaths are randomly distributed across the population and not correlated with age. Car accidents being a major example of that (unless there's a bunch of 70+ year olds at Yankees games that I'm not seeing).
- graton 3y ago
  Could also say the same thing about car accidents. The death rates for car accidents is different based on gender. What is the gender ratio at those Yankees games? :) I'm willing to hand-wave over a lot of this stuff as otherwise it gets way too overcome with pedantry which likely doesn't matter...

darkclouds 3y ago

[flagged]

thworp 3y ago

I half agree with you, but if we're only talking about death and accident prevention it would be worth it to look at other highly developed countries that have much lower accident rates (there are quite a few that have much lower numbers, both per capita and per mile). Of course, copying these countries will take time, especially because half the problem is the terrible drivers education and lax enforcement which precludes quite a few measures. Things that could be done right now are: * designing roads to calm traffic (bends and such): highly effective at reducing pedestrian/cyclist accidents * building proper separated bike paths * mandatory inspections in all states. a non-negligible % of accidents are caused by defective vehicles * mandating and actually enforcing minimum following distance on highways * banning modifications like steel plate grills (basically a human-crushing ram) * scrapping the entire tax and regulation scheme that lead to the size wars in trucks and SUVs Then there are things like replacing more STOP signs with YIELD, roundabouts, giving bike paths green lights together with turning traffic (requires drivers to look in their blindspot and yield) and lane discipline. Those broadly reduce frustration and fatigue which helps people stay calm.

RC_ITR 3y ago
> half agree with you, but if we're only talking about death and accident prevention it would be worth it to look at other highly developed countries that have much lower accident rates (there are quite a few that have much lower numbers, both per capita and per mile). We live in an interesting time where it's an instinct to say 'Sure 45k people die each year from this, but how does that benchmark?' Even if Germany had a 40x higher/lower rate than the US, why does it matter when people are still needlessly dying?
- thworp 3y ago
  First, I meant that as a suggestion to look at comparable countries and look at what they're doing because it has been proven it will work. That is as opposed to different measure which might work but have side effects. That leads me to the heart of your comment. Sure you could institute some kind of dystopian dictatorship that makes sure nobody dies of the causes we deem preventable now. But it would be a cure that kills the patient (free society). So, there are always trade offs. What I was saying is that looking at other countries and what they've done you can see the trade offs in advance and decide if they're worth it.

ot1138 3y ago

[flagged]