Jiro comments on How to avoid dying in a car crash - Less Wrong

75 Post author: michaelcurzi 17 March 2012 07:44PM

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Comment author: Jiro 28 February 2014 03:22:13PM -1 points [-]

Also, statistics and my personal experience indicates that the most effective way of avoiding traffic accidents is to live in a western country other than the United States

That doesn't correct for urbanization, which could affect the statistics in any number of ways (both positive and negative), so is worthless.

Comment author: VAuroch 21 July 2014 05:02:41AM -1 points [-]

Canada is less urbanized, Western Europe is more urbanized. All have lower deaths than the USA.

Also, why should that correction be necessary? If urbanization leads to lower car deaths, that's a good reason to move to a more urbanized place. I can't find any significant number of news stories about subway deaths, and bus travel would count as cars, so there isn't slack being picked up by other methods of transport.

Comment author: Lumifer 21 July 2014 04:30:37PM 0 points [-]

If urbanization leads to lower car deaths, that's a good reason to move to a more urbanized place.

No, it's not, because you're ignoring other causes of death and we already know that everything else is not equal.

Comment author: VAuroch 21 July 2014 08:42:30PM -1 points [-]

I didn't mean to imply that it's a reason which should override other ones. What I did mean was that

Also, statistics and my personal experience indicates that the most effective way of avoiding traffic accidents is to live in a western country other than the United States

is true even if urbanization is a confounding factor.

Comment author: Lumifer 21 July 2014 09:07:28PM *  2 points [-]

is true

Is not.

Emphasis mine: "...the most effective way of avoiding traffic accidents" is to change countries. Oh, really?

By the way, the US is a diverse country. Traffic fatalities per 100,000 population: Italy 6.2, Belgium 7.2, Massachusetts 5.3. So, is the most effective way of avoiding traffic accidents is to move to Boston? DC is even better -- 2.4 fatalities per 100,000 population...

Comment author: VAuroch 22 July 2014 10:34:57PM -1 points [-]

That's true.

Comment author: Nornagest 21 July 2014 07:24:15AM *  0 points [-]

Canada is less urbanized [than the US]

Technically true, but the difference is small: about two percent less of the population living in urban areas, which is the usual measure of urbanization. Canada has a smaller population and a larger land area, but most of its land is very sparsely populated. (Several European countries, incidentally, are less urbanized than the US by this measure, including Germany and the UK.)

It does seem to have fewer road fatalities by most reasonable measures, though. It's closest if the denominator is in distance driven, and even there the US is about 15% higher.