A study conducted by Michael Sivak of the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute concluded that traffic fatalities had a strongly inverse relationship to gas prices during the past year.
Should the March and April 2008 trends continue, the 2008 annual fatalities would drop under 40,000 for the first time in 1961.
Addendum: See my other two post about benefits of high gas prices here and here.
I’m curios as to what the “other” benefits are to high gas prices?
Great Point. I should have referenced my two previous posts.
A quick summary of benefits include:
*Less obesity as people are more apt to walk or ride a bicycle.
*Less pollution as more people use mass transportation, walk, or bicycle.
*Shorter commutes as people relocate (over time) closer to the places they work thus giving them more leisure and family time.
*An increased incentive for entrepreneurs to invest in alternative fuels and create more American jobs.
~JWK
I agree that lower traffic fatalities are definitely a positive attribute to the ever increasing gas prices, however with that said it can be argued that some of these “benefits” are simply a growing and changing soicial economic future. Three of the so-called benefits to high gas prices in the list can be partially and/or completely accredited to social evalution. Meaning, obesity has been an ongoing global problem for many years and this has a lot to do with the decrease in adolecent activity behavior, advanced technology, and an increase in fast-food establishments to name a few. There is something to be said for commutes and the fact that there is a percentage of people choosing to move closer to work, I would argue that people as a whole however are moving to lower cost of living areas and also to less dense populated communities/states and thus end up living closer to where they work by virture of the move, but there is no proof that the sole reason or should I say top reason they are moving is because of gas prices. And lastly, the entrepreneurs, I will not bore you with history statistics that fully support the fact that from the beginning of man and the climb of the social ladder we have strived to better ourselves. For the better part of 40 years Earth as a whole has looked at alternative resources, not just fuel. Several inventions have replaced products that were harmful to both humans and earth over the last decades thus proving that incentives for entrepreneurs can not be soley attributed to high gas prices. I do agree that there are positives to the increase in fuel but they can hardly be called benefits when they are not the sole outcome or reason for the increase. I do want to applaud you for your blog. Very interesting read.
No One –
I am not sure the case of “benefits” versus “incentives” isn’t a bit of a debate in semantics, but I would gladly accept the notion: “higher fuel costs are providing additional incentives for these behaviors.”
I am not sure I understand your point about the commuting/moving. But I do think the incentive is there. Some anecdotal evidence: I asked a friend and fellow UCA Alumni if she was attending the Bears opening game this Thursday, she responded: “There is no way I spending the money on gas to come to Conway tomorrow.” She lives about 15 miles down the road in Maumelle.
Nonetheless – Thanks for the feedback. I began this blog with the hope that others would challenge some of the ideas I presented here. As you can see – traffic is still slow.
~JWK