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I put 40k on my first car and hit stuff enough to warrant replacing something - often just a fender etc - at least 5 times. Only one fender bender when I rear ended someone at ~15 mph talking on my phone like an asshole.

I know I'm a worse driver than most. But I also wouldn't say that my similarly young friends average anywhere close to 1 such error per 250k miles. Definitely closer 25k.

Mentally reviewing the people I'm close to, the figure seems to be off by at least an order of magnitude.

Per mile is a pretty poor measure. My dad drives at least 40K/year (long commute) and has averaged one accident per 20 years - but obviously for a regular driver following a familiar route the chances of an accident are pretty low. I would expect someone who drives less would actually have more accidents/year.

I think it includes truckers who are far safer than normal drivers on average and do a lot of driving.