>>1912960I got to agree with the other anon, 7% sounds just way too high. I google it and here's what I found:
> Actual direct cost - 340 Billion, 1,6% of GDP>This considers societal costs not directly related to the crash, such as "insurance premiums, taxes, congestion-related costs such as lost time, excess fuel consumption, and increased environmental impacts", amounting to 3/4 of the figure.> The 1,4 Trillion figure is obtained "When quality-of-life valuations are considered"So overall, I'm not sure the 7% figure is reliable, since they're basically including things that aren't actual crash costs. Even the 1,6% figure is kinda dubious. I guess that cars are so prevalent in American society it's feasible, but the way they calculate costs is so reaching that I'm not sure you're actually obtaining the direct cost when you sum everything up. At this point, how do they know one thing in the list doesn't affect the other, or that they aren't double counting some things, or that the costs still scale linearly?
It's not that it's bullshit, it's that it's a very in-depth study that is liable to many mistakes and relies on many assumptions to not be broken, which does make the figure suspicious, specially because it ends up being such a high figure. When you do a very complex calculation and the end result is unintuitive, it usually means a double-check is in order.
Source:
https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/traffic-crashes-cost-america-billions-2019 
