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Spin Zone / At what cost safety?
« on: March 25, 2016, 08:40:41 AM »
Let's say there is a $200 device that, if added to every vehicle, could prevent deaths caused by cars backing into people?
Sounds great, doesn't it? The possibility of saving an estimated 300 fatalities each year.
But, let's do some math.
According to wikipedia, there about 250,000,000 registered highway vehicles.
For math simplicity, let's assume the average vehicle age is 10 years, that give us 25,000,000 new vehicles every year which will have this $200 safety feature. Total annual cost is: Five billion dollars, every year. To save 300 people. Or over 16 millions dollars per life saved. (even if the number of new vehicles is only 15,000,000, the cost to society would still be 10 millions dollars per life saved - but in 2015 there were over 17 million cars sold in the US)
And people are talking about other safety features being mandated for cars (e.g., automatic breaking systems to the tune of more than what? $1500?)
what cost safety?
Sounds great, doesn't it? The possibility of saving an estimated 300 fatalities each year.
But, let's do some math.
According to wikipedia, there about 250,000,000 registered highway vehicles.
For math simplicity, let's assume the average vehicle age is 10 years, that give us 25,000,000 new vehicles every year which will have this $200 safety feature. Total annual cost is: Five billion dollars, every year. To save 300 people. Or over 16 millions dollars per life saved. (even if the number of new vehicles is only 15,000,000, the cost to society would still be 10 millions dollars per life saved - but in 2015 there were over 17 million cars sold in the US)
And people are talking about other safety features being mandated for cars (e.g., automatic breaking systems to the tune of more than what? $1500?)
what cost safety?