Written by: Sam Thorpe
10/15/2021
The drop in driving in 2020
You’re not alone if you think that driving today is much different than during or before the 2020 pandemic. Drivers around the United States have been noticing that other automobile operators on the road are driving even worse than before, speeds are up higher, and patience is at an all-time low. The data and insurance information that is so far available for the 2021 year is limited but already paints a damning picture of the state of American roads. Though it is somewhat easy to parse the data into a recognizable phenomenon, the root causes are much less identifiable. What is happening will be easy to pull from the data, but why is another question.
The drastic change during the initial lockdowns of the 2020 pandemic are very evident when looking at the data from 2016-2020 on motor vehicle accidents in the United States. Looking at my home state of Michigan, 312,172 in 2016, 314,921 in 2017, 312,798 in 2018, 314,377 in 2019 and a massive drop 245,432 in 2020. The percent change between the listed years before 2020 is under half of a percent (.87%, -.68%, .5%) respectively, but the percent change between 2019 and 2020 is -28.09%! Considering how stable the rate of change has been, 2020 was a drastic change in driving skills of Michigan residents and of the rest of the United States.
To see Michigan State Police’s Traffic Crash data, click here.
To read more about the NSC’s preliminary 2021 data, click here.
The data from Michigan is like the other states throughout the United States, but with the world now firmly in 2021 (almost November of that year at the time of writing this article), what happened after 2020 to create this noticeable increase in aggressive driving and traffic accidents is what is most interesting. Without the year being over, there is not comprehensive data from various states’ Traffic Crash Reporting Systems or in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administrations’ (NHTSA) final reports. What can be looked at is insurance company estimates and per month preliminary results that are starting to come out of various states.
For some interesting further reading, check out this breakdown from the NSC about the impact of recessions on driving habits in the United States: NSC’s Impact of Recessions
The rise in motor vehicle accidents and deaths
To accurately understand the changes in driving in the United States, the differences between 2019 and 2021 will be examined. If we have returned to ‘normal’ driving in the US, the differences between 2019 and 2021 should be minor, realistically under 1%, like the changes observed between 2016 and 2019. In fact, the National Safety Council (NSC), one of the major organizations which tracks and reports road and traffic related incidents, is already predicting a rise over 24% in deaths per miles traveled by automobiles in the United States in 2021 compared to 2019. Official reporting from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), which is part of the Center for Disease Control (CDC), which reports the final data for each year in the United States often publishes its reports a year after the surveyed year. The National Safety Council finds that their estimates reflect the NCHS reports with under a 1% difference.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released a preliminary report in September 2021 which noted many of the same things that the NSC is seeing as well. “These early estimates suggest the driving patterns and behaviors the agency reported in 2020, which changed significantly from previous years, continue to prevail and that drivers who remained on the roads engaged in more risky behavior, including speeding, failing to wear seat belts, and driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol.” Noted the September 2nd, 2021, press release from the NHTSA. The NHTSA has linked the increased traffic accidents in 2021 with the increase in risky behaviors from 2020, which is certainly a fair assumption to make. An important question to be answered will be whether this increase is a temporary reaction or a permanent phenomenon.
What is next?
Though the year is not over, and the full data is not available, there is little chance to expect a change from this rise in traffic accidents in the first half of 2021. A good sign would be an overall drop from the beginning of 2021 to the end of year, signifying that this rise in traffic accidents is a temporary phenomenon because of the 2020 pandemic lockdowns. If the trends continue to stay the same or even increase, this chance may turn out to be more permanent. It is obvious that there needs to be a change, but it is difficult to ascertain what the right change might be. Some may argue that more police and traffic enforcement would solve the problem, but other events in 2020 have certainly illustrated that the police are not a good solution to public safety issues. Another option would be to look at how roads and traffic laws are designed and make changes to increase on-road safety. This should always be a priority, but if this was the primary issue in causing the increased traffic accidents in 2021, something would have had to have changed drastically on the roads before then. Much of this change seems to be attributable to the metamorphoses which the Covid-19 pandemic has forced every individual through, and the impatience and anger that appears more and more often today.
Take a deep breath, let that car pass, and remember that the only thing on the road you have control over is yourself. Drive safe!
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