This isn't meant as political advocacy, just the result of some research on my part, and my surprise at how bad my guesses (and others' guesses) were before doing the research. What would your guesses be?
No idea on the absolute numbers here, but I "think" that motor vehicle death rate is quite high, and murders are much rarer. Similarly, I know that crime rates have been decreasing (fewer deaths now than in 1991, but I don't know exactly how much). My only real "wild ass guess" was that motor vehicle death rates have been decreasing.
Given advances in safety technology, it'd be amazing if motor vehicle deaths weren't decreasing... the question is by how much. My guess on that one was about right but I think I looked at the numbers once before, a few years ago.
I know that crime rates have been decreasing and that approximately the early 90s was the high water mark for crime. I also know that improved safety features (air bags, anti-lock brakes, crumple zones) have resulted in a steady downward trend in motor vehicle deaths, but for both, I have no idea the scale of the decrease since 1991.
safety equipment, and also cellphones - while people talking on cellphones has created a new danger on the road, I have to think that having people able to quickly report accidents has got to have made a huge difference in how fast police/ambulances respond, and that should improve survival stats.
Yeah, I waffled with "no change" on that one because while safety generally improves gradually, I don't recall a lot of *spectacular* improvements in that time-frame, and I know people have been driving more, particularly since planes got more annoying after 2001. Hadn't the faintest clue how those factors would balance against each other.
And I think a lot of us folks who like to think we know how bad people are at risk assessment tend to now overcompensate when comparing auto deaths to anything else, since they're sort of the standard reference for "thing that causes a shit-ton of fatalities that everyone just accepts as normal somehow, while being panicky about other much less likely risks".
Suicides account for almost 2/3 of firearms-related deaths. I don't know off the top of my head what percentage of firearms-related deaths are accidental shootings. The firearms-related death rate also includes police shootings which may not be included in the homicide rate.
On the other hand, I'm certain that the motor vehicle death rate does not include car-related carbon monoxide poisoning, either as suicide or accidental. While I don't think adding those numbers into the motor vehicle death rate would up the numbers that much, they need to be included if we want to make a reasonable comparison between firearms-related death rates and motor-vehicle related death rates. But it makes more sense to leave suicides out completely, since most of the studies I have seen indicate that suicide rates don't decline when firearms (or motor vehicles, for that matter) aren't available.
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And I think a lot of us folks who like to think we know how bad people are at risk assessment tend to now overcompensate when comparing auto deaths to anything else, since they're sort of the standard reference for "thing that causes a shit-ton of fatalities that everyone just accepts as normal somehow, while being panicky about other much less likely risks".
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On the other hand, I'm certain that the motor vehicle death rate does not include car-related carbon monoxide poisoning, either as suicide or accidental. While I don't think adding those numbers into the motor vehicle death rate would up the numbers that much, they need to be included if we want to make a reasonable comparison between firearms-related death rates and motor-vehicle related death rates. But it makes more sense to leave suicides out completely, since most of the studies I have seen indicate that suicide rates don't decline when firearms (or motor vehicles, for that matter) aren't available.
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