Does everyone suck at driving now?

TL;DR

Driving is genuinely getting worse due to distraction, speed, larger vehicles, and stress — not just elderly or impaired drivers.

Key Points

• 1.U.S. road deaths surged dramatically over a decade. Fatalities rose from 32,719 in 2013 to 42,939 in 2021, the highest in years, totaling 415,000 deaths from 2013–2023.
• 2.Recognition error is the single biggest crash cause. NHTSA data shows 41% of driver-caused crashes stem from recognition failures — surpassing speed (29%) and impairment (30%) as the largest individual category.
• 3.Bigger, heavier vehicles dramatically increase pedestrian danger. A pickup truck at 30 mph carries a 76% risk of major pedestrian injury versus 37% for a midsize sedan; modern SUVs and trucks hit higher on the body, striking heads and torsos.
• 4.Speed kills with compounding physics. A 5 mph speed limit increase links to 8% more highway fatalities; stopping distance at 60 mph is 292 ft versus 221 ft at 50 mph — a 32% increase for only a 20% speed gain.
• 5.Distraction and shrinking attention spans are reshaping road risk. In 2023, distracted driving caused 3,275 deaths and 324,819 injuries; NHTSA found eyes off the road for just 2+ seconds sharply raises crash likelihood, worsened by giant in-car touchscreens.
• 6.Practical solutions exist but require systemic change. Proposals include Finland-style driver training, retesting every decade, universal insurance-funded driver's ed (costing $2.88B versus insurers' $37.6B profit), and sharing minor crash data nationally — self-driving cars and public transit are long-term, not immediate, fixes.