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Comment by kurthr | Hacker News Reader

Drivers are spending >10% of their time on phones?

   Before the start of the trial, the participants all averaged more than 6.4 
   minutes per hour of handheld use while driving...
   Paying drivers on top of competitive gamification was the most effective way 
   to get them to put down their phones. This group reduced its handheld usage by 
   27.6 percent, or 89 seconds/hour, compared to the control.

But monitoring and paying them reduced this to only 7% of driving time.

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Drivers enrolled in the Progressive Snapshot program (who voluntarily installed an app that monitors their driving habits) are spending >10% of time on their phones. For an average commute, that would be over 100 hours of phone-while-driving per year. I really hope this is the "bad group" and not a representative sample.

Radical proposal: These people should be incentivized straight off the road. They should lose their insurance and possibly their license.

Agree 100%... Getting caught using a phone while driving, should be punishable by a suspended 5-year prison sentence contingent upon completion of a 1 year smartphone ban. Get caught using anything other than a flip phone at any point during the next year and you have to serve the prison term.

I think no smartphone ban is a little harsh. It's needed for modern banking or interacting with government services or for job hunting or even work. Even the government hands out free smartphones via the Lifeline / "ObamaPhone" program

There's a PC alternative for all those. And even a computer free one.. at least in my EU country. To me it would not be a bad idea, and the governements should ensure it's still possible to do all those things without a smartphone.

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