this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2025
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Mildly Interesting

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[–] DrWorm@piefed.social 72 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Mississippi is always the worst of any statistic

[–] Lembot_0004@discuss.online 27 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Ok, noted: New York is almost on par with civilized regions.

[–] funkajunk@lemmy.world 25 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That might be skewed as most of their population are in New York City, and more than half of the city doesn't even own a car.

[–] The_v@lemmy.world 24 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's pretty much the point of the chart. Better public infrastructure decrease the deaths from cars.

[–] Xaphanos@lemmy.world 5 points 23 hours ago

Or commuting accidents in traffic are rarely fatal.

[–] Geometrinen_Gepardi@sopuli.xyz 27 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I understand this is largely due to Americans wanting to get drunk like everyone else but also having to drive everywhere.

[–] apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world 31 points 1 day ago (2 children)

And gigantic motor vehicles.

[–] Lemminary@lemmy.world 13 points 1 day ago (2 children)

And terrible roads and/or regulations? I can't help but notice the worst offenders are conservative areas and those usually are neglectful.

[–] PancakesCantKillMe@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

The transportation departments of red states just funnel the monies to corrupt buddies and nothing gets fixed even though there is perpetual road work being (performatively) done.

[–] apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world 6 points 20 hours ago

And lack of pedestrian infrastructure, and..., and... We can go on and on at how baked into the cake these deaths are in the car cult.

[–] Botzo@lemmy.world 6 points 18 hours ago

There are so many dumb regulations and circumstances that functionally push people to giant vehicles.

For instance: I replaced my 2016 VW golf base model with an electric F150 this year for a multitude of reasons. I got a refund from insurance (with the same coverage). None of this makes sense except that I'm less likely to be injured by other motorists in my 3.5ton truck. I found this depressing.

[–] huppakee@feddit.nl 18 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Thought it would be interesting to compare with EU, they published an article in 2023 (https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?oldid=630784) with the following data. This graph uses a number per 1 million inhabitants so divide by 10 to compare it.

collapsed inline mediaRoad accident fatalities, 2023 (number per million inhabitants)

[–] Coelacanth@aggregatet.org 4 points 1 day ago (3 children)

As far as I know Finland has the world's strictest driving licence, so I'm actually surprised to see it posting worse statistics than Sweden here.

[–] Valmond@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

Sweden went insane with road security in the nineties (nollvisionen?) so maybe that's why.

[–] AmidFuror@fedia.io 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Need to factor in terrain and weather conditions too.

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[–] Tobberone@slrpnk.net 2 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

Sweden is as expected. 200-something fatalities for 10 million people. Norway stands out😃

It got me thinking about definitions, though. For Sweden every death during transportation is counted (including busses, heavy trucks and single accidents with a bike), while the definition my 2 minute googling found for Canada said deaths resulting from accidents involving automobiles.

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[–] burntbacon@discuss.tchncs.de 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Took a closer look to see if I was surprised by any correlation about poverty, and browsed away with the belief that the south is still a shithole... which might still correlate with poverty. I think kansas/oregon is the first entry that wouldn't be 'south.'

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

Drinkin' beers an' drivin' yer trukk is a highly traditional pastime in the US deep south. Typically done in the middle of the night, in my experience, for the maximum probability of contacting the local wildlife or making friends at high speed with a tree.

[–] NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone 7 points 7 hours ago (9 children)

Victoria is that low cos they don’t fuck around when it comes to driving fines. The speed limit means limit, and they’re cracking down hard on drivers using phones.

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[–] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 6 points 19 hours ago (5 children)

America is more in the middle of the road when you look at the whole globe, and don’t just select a few counties with lower death rates.

https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/indicators/indicator-details/GHO/estimated-road-traffic-death-rate-(per-100-000-population)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate

Africa is currently the reigning champ for vehicle related deaths.

[–] FarraigePlaisteach@lemmy.world 12 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

I think it’s fair to compare like with like. Many African countries have poor infrastructure, inadequate enforcement of traffic laws, rapid urbanization, unsafe vehicles, and limited emergency medical services. Its easy for a Western country to look better compared to that, but is it a fair comparison?

[–] AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 4 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Well, if you're comparing the US south, it might be fitting.

[–] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 2 points 16 hours ago

That’s not fair. Blue state tax pays have paid for some really nice infrastructure down there.

[–] bier@feddit.nl 11 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

The Netherlands has 4.19

The Netherlands is close in size to Maryland, and close in the number of inhabitants as New York. Also half of the traffic is cars and half is bicycles. It's pretty insane how bad Mississippi is.

[–] LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world 3 points 14 hours ago (6 children)

I tried looking into why Mississippi was so far worse. Mostly just finding people self report texting and driving more there, infrastructure is shitty, enforcement is shitty, DUIs are high they recently just upped the civil fine of texting while driving from $25 to $100.

For fun I looked to see what Mississippi would be like if it was its own country, and do to GDP it was compared to Morocco and Kenya.

Car Deaths per 100,000

Mississippi: 26 Morocco: 17.29 Kenya: 28

Kenya is 4x as dense as Mississippi is though, so still hard to say Mississippi is safer than Kenya. It's just numbers

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[–] breecher@sh.itjust.works 10 points 6 hours ago

Yes, but that does not make it any better, since the US should be compared to other Western developed countries. That is like people saying that the number of gun deaths in the US isn't that bad because they are worse in Ukraine or Syria, you know, active war zones.

[–] Allemaniac@lemmy.world 7 points 6 hours ago

yes but whole africa is developing nations with ultra bad infrastructure like roads and intersections. You should be comparing USA to peering nations, like western europe or countries of the commonwealth. Unless you admit that USA is also third world shit hole

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[–] Allemaniac@lemmy.world 5 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

getting a drivers license in mississippi is basically show up to the DMV, suck a cock and drive home or what?

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[–] ChicoSuave@lemmy.world 5 points 23 hours ago (2 children)

New Jersey is too low. Serious doubts about the validity of this table.

[–] HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 7 points 22 hours ago

Probably not. The state has been implementing Vision Zero as a statewide program along with several cities.

The two major highways have lower than average accidents due to design.

One of the state's signature traffic configurations, the Jersey Jughandle, eliminates left turn movements on older highways, a major source of accidents.

[–] match@pawb.social 7 points 18 hours ago

It's comparing against total population, not driving population, so any amount of mass transit will greatly reduce this number

[–] Dorkyd68@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

The south is killing it!

[–] Magister@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Not surprised by SC, as a Canadian I had one accident in 40 years of driving, it was in SC, caused by a 17yo girl driving an old suburban or something.

[–] goldenquetzal@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

I'd like to see the % of trucks vs cars for each location.

[–] Hupf@feddit.org 3 points 6 hours ago

21 Mississippi, 22 Mississippi...

collapsed inline mediaCount van Count

[–] dastechniker@lemmy.world 3 points 19 hours ago

SOUTH CAROLINA #2!!!! 🥳🥳🎉🎊🎉🎉🎊🍻🥳🎉🎉🪅

[–] AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 2 points 1 day ago

USA #1! 🇺🇸🦅🇺🇸

[–] FelixCress@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Is it the issue of safety standards?

[–] ClanOfTheOcho@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm guessing there is some correlation to total miles(/km) driven. Not all of it, but some. If people in one location drive drastically less distance annually, I'd expect their numbers to show drastically lower on the chart, as well.

[–] FelixCress@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

I am not convinced with Australia and Canada being much better? It would make sense if you were comparing to Europe.

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