I really would like to know the absolute numbers for this reduction. It's really questionable if this would hold up with millions of Teslas on the road in the hands of less wealthy(probably better educated) drivers.
You mean drivers like the ones behind the wheel of all the BMWs and Audis that cut me off with no turn signals, speed, make aggressive lane changes, tailgate, and generally act like giant douches because a simple traffic ticket is nothing to their pocketbook while their time == money?
Those people are going to be a hell of a lot safer behind the wheel of an autonomous (level 4) vehicle where they can be on the phone and their laptop as the vehicle obeys the speed limits and safe following distance.
Could just be the numbers of those kinds of cars in my area though.
Generally I feel that a douche can drive any type of car, and I try to drive in fear like everyone else on the road is a drunk prison escapee.
(1) provisional licence holders - new drivers (and also people who have lost their licence) have to display "P" plates for a year here (Australia).
I've seen jalopies driven like someone has been up on speed for 4 days straight.
Or the drivers in cheap sensible cars that are terrified of merging onto the freeway faster than 40 mph.
And the distracted drivers who realize they're about to miss their exit so they hammer on the brakes and put on their turn signal and completely fail to match speeds.
Ricers with after market exhaust are another kind of car that usually drives way too fast and aggressive compared to how their lowered suspension actually performs.
The people in road tanks who seem to split the difference between terrified and aggressive and expect you to just get out of their way because they're bigger.
I'm probably missing entire swaths of shitty drivers that I can't think of right now because my blood sugar is a bit low.
Somehow I manage to consistently undertake people who are going slow in the left lane safely. Its not that hard.
Finland has a system where a traffic ticket is a certain percentage of your monthly income. For example, running a red light is typically fined for 25% of your monthly income.
You can buy traction control, ABS, better suspension, steering, better tires, etc. None of that will make the idiot behind the wheel any better, although it may lead to overconfidence.
Thanks for making my point for me though.
"Results Studies 1 and 2. Our first two studies were naturalistic field studies, and examined whether upper-class individuals behave more unethically than lower-class individuals while driving. In study 1, we investigated whether upper-class drivers were more likely to cut off other vehicles at a busy four-way intersection with stop signs on all sides. As vehicles are reliable indicators of a person's social rank and wealth (15), we used observers’ codes of vehicle status (make, age, and appearance) to index drivers’ social class. Observers stood near the intersection, coded the status of approaching vehicles, and recorded whether the driver cut off other vehicles by crossing the intersection before waiting their turn, a behavior that defies the California Vehicle Code. In the present study, 12.4% of drivers cut in front of other vehicles. A binary logistic regression indicated that upper-class drivers were the most likely to cut off other vehicles at the intersection, even when controlling for time of day, driver's perceived sex and age, and amount of traffic, b = 0.36, SE b = 0.18, P < 0.05"
But given that they've shown this 40% crash rate reduction in their current demographic, it's reasonable to expect to see a similar reduction in other demographics (maybe not of the same magnitude, but at least in the same direction).
A Tesla is not a cheap car. I kind of suspect the average Tesla driver is more responsible than the average driver. It may be the case that the average Tesla driver is very well off, and treat the cars as expensive toys though, so it's tough to say without numbers. If i had to bet right now, i'd bet on the more responsible side though.
If you study rich drivers I have no doubt that you would find that they cut people off more, overtake in more dangerous situations, use their indicators less, drive over the speed limit more, proceed through amber signals later, run red lights more often, and generally show less regard for the rules than other drivers.
This behaviour will also correlate to other areas of life where richer people simply care less for the rules. They're more likely to use social contacts or money (e.g.: "lawyer up") to get themselves out of any trouble they find themselves in.
Teslas are not cheap cars. Given that money is (social evidence of) power, the people buying Teslas (and other expensive cars in general) are likely to expect other drivers to respect their status as powerful people.
I would be willing to bet money that the insurance actuaries that actually calculate risk disagree with your extremely prejudiced opinion.
You're assuming that accident rates are directly correlated with claim rates, however. A wealthy individual is less likely claim for a minor accident, preferring to pay out of pocket for small repairs rather than take a big hit on their premiums. Someone less wealthy may not have that option.
There are other reasons why wealth may reduce your risk to insurers that are unrelated to safe driving. You're less likely to leave a car parked insecurely in a dodgy part of town, for example.
Finally, "drivers of luxury brand cars" certainly aren't the same set as "wealthy people with good credit records". Plenty of lower net worth people can still manage a lease on a BMW or Mercedes, or buy a used one.
Drivers of luxury cars cause more accidents, insurers say: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/insurance...
I'm still waiting to hear how your personal opinion about wealthy drivers is more accurate than auto insurance actuaries that calculate risk for a living.
FWIW, in case you were unaware, Hacker News doesn't allow commenters to downvote direct replies. So whoever might've downvoted you wasn't the parent, and someone corrected it with an upvote or undown (your comment isn't gray as of this writing).
This list is not strongly related to risk /of/ accident, but is correlated with severity (a small change is likely to have a small correlation with severity).
* over the speed limit
* overtake in (more) dangerous situations
* through amber signals later
All of these are very bad things that everyone should avoid doing, and signals should be given starting 5-10 seconds before the action.
* use indicators less
* cut people off
* run red lightsWhich seems like the current driver profile is possibly safer than the overall population since it's unlikely a large percentage of young drivers own a $100k car. It seems like the effect of widespread autopilot could be greater if it included this cohort.
In 2015 2.44 million people were injured in car accidents. That's a much more telling figure of just how bad most drivers are. Apparently our cars are just really safe.
There are some truly consistently horrible drivers. But in general most people do ok most of the time. I think the real challenge is cutting of that really bad end of the distribution, which autopilot seems to be doing.
Similarily, airplane pilots spend so much time in autopilot mode that they forget how to operate a plane in emergency situations.
20 years ago they redid the traffic pattern where I used to live to something many people found really confusing and many people claimed felt dangerous. A study 2 years later found that, while it was true that accidents on that part of the road had increased, the number of injuries due to accidents had plummeted. A follow up study a few years later found that accidents had dropped back to around their original level and serious injuries where still basically at zero.
Another factor is the extent to which bad driving doesn't result in an accident, either because of infrastructure, other drivers reacting, or just a lack of cars. For example, most red light runners don't cause a crash because stoplights usually have an all-red period to compensate, there often aren't other cars to crash into, and other cars might brake to avoid crashing into the culprit.
Many crashes require two bad drivers to misbehave at about the same time. For example, I couldn't tell you how many times I've had somebody change lanes into me, but it hasn't (yet) resulted in a crash because I've seen it and gotten out of the way before they hit.
love you, internet.
For my assumption I assume that due to the higher cost of a Tesla better educated people are opting for them over the alternative because of the environmental benefits.
I mean, who do you think is more likely to buy a Tesla: A 20 year old fresh college graduate, or his 'uneducated' father who has been saving and investing for 30 years and just sold his lifelong home in San Francisco? My bet is on the latter. The boomers in particular are considered the wealthiest generation ever, but not the most educated generation ever.
I'm rather fascinated by how many are questioning the education thing here though. Coming from a farming community, where every (older) farmer I know is multimillions simply by virtue of having purchased farmland when they were young, it's difficult to see how education had any impact on that wealth. Some of them do have educations, some don't. It doesn't seem to make any difference.
OP linked wealth with being better educated, he also inferred that better educated and wealthy meant they would be better drivers. However as others have pointed out there are studies showing that wealthier individuals make worse drivers (the studies don't appear factor in education level and wealth is determined by brand of vehicle).
I disagreed with OPs sentiment that fewer wealthy (and therefore worse educated - in OPs opinion) drivers would result in more crashes.
Doesn't that contradict what you said before: "Are you assuming the more wealthy owners have lower levels of education?" Although I think it is quite reasonable to assume that the wealthy do have less education, statistically speaking, give the nature of wealth and the more recent focus of educating the populace.
Heck, when I graduated high school in 2000, only 64% of us did graduate. The graduation rate for high school, less than two decades later, is now over 80%. That's substantial growth over what is a fairly short period of time, all things considered. And the rate gets worse the further back you go.
> I disagreed with OPs sentiment that fewer wealthy (and therefore worse educated - in OPs opinion) drivers would result in more crashes.
That was my misunderstanding. I thought you meant that you did not agree with the sentiment that wealthy people could be less educated. Thanks for the clarification.