Comment 117504

By kevlahan (registered) | Posted April 07, 2016 at 08:17:52 in reply to Comment 117494

I guess this is a rhetorical question (or you would have answered it yourself) aimed at getting a small number that you can ignore.

But for the benefit of readers who might want to have an idea of how to estimate the risk of being a "killer" or "injurer" here is a calculation:

percentage of total population who are licensed to drive: 66% (taking this number underestimates the risk since many licensed drivers do not drive or drive infrequently) based on stats can figures from 2006.

population of Hamilton: 520,000

number of years someone is driving: about 60

number of annual deaths: 25 (roughly) number of annual injuries: 2500 (roughly)

So this gives the lifetime risk of a driver killing someone as:

(1-(1-25/(0.66x520000))^60)*100 = 0.44%

And the lifetime risk of a driver injuring someone as:

(1-(1-2500/(0.66x520000))^60)*100 = 36%

So the risk of a driver being a "killer" is indeed small, but certainly non-negligible (about one out of every 2300 drivers will kill), while the risk of injuring someone is very high: more than 1/3 of drivers will injure someone during their driving career.

This doesn't include air pollution deaths and disease for which all drivers roughly share the responsibility.

If we include the 93 deaths caused by air pollution and randomly assign them to individual drivers, then the "killer" rate goes up to a very significant 2%. So, including both collisions and air pollution the lifetime risk of a driver killing someone is greater than 2% (given the fact we included all licensed drivers rather than only active drivers).

Comment edited by kevlahan on 2016-04-07 08:30:44

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