Statistics help tell stories, and one of them, often touted by technologists, engineers, cops, and even the federal government, told stories. Statistics: 94% of traffic accidents in the United States are human-caused.
People are responsible for their destinies. So instead of putting the burden of road safety on systems—how roads are built, how cars are designed, how roads are managed—it puts it on the driver, the pedestrian, or the cyclist.
This statistic is based on a misunderstanding of a 2015 report from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the U.S. Department of Transportation responsible for U.S. road safety. The report examined crashes between 2005 and 2007 and found that drivers were the “key cause” of most crashes.
But the driver’s actions were usually the last in a long chain of events. In other words, the driver’s erratic wheel movement was the last thing that went wrong.