Car Insurance Accident Statistics (2007 – 2008)
Looking at your car insurance rates can be depressing when the premiums rise. Car insurance rates never seem to go down even when you have a good driving record. It’s not necessarily your driving record that is affecting your insurance rates as the driving records of people around you.
When car insurance companies are developing their rates, they are looking at information from all across the United States. What they are seeing is that each year, there are more than 6 million automobile accidents in the United States that kill an average of 40,000 people.
Statistics from 1994-2003 show that men are 50% more likely to be involved in accidents and 61% more likely to be killed in an accident than women. So when your car insurance company sets its rates, who gets the higher rate? Men will because the insurance company is much more likely to have to pay reimbursements for men.
In 2008, there were a total of over 5.8 million car crashes; 1,630,000 accidents that caused injury; 4,146,000 only caused property damage and 34,017 accidents were fatal.
As scary as those numbers can be, fatalities are the lowest they have been since 1961 and this has continued into 2009. If this trend continues, then you should see your car insurance rates decrease.
Car accidents injured 2.35 million people in 2008. That is the lowest number since the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration started collecting the data in 1988.
While these statistics are promising for lower future car insurance rates, there will remain individual variations in different groups.
For instance, between 1994 and 2003, teenagers represented 22% of the drivers in the country, but they were involved in 22% of the accidents. Over the same time period, adults age 35-44 represented 21% of the country’s drivers, but they were involved in only 16% of accidents. This is why car insurance rates for teenagers are higher than adults. Teens are involved in more car accidents that cause car insurance companies to pay out more money.
Though teenagers are more likely to be in an accident, senior citizens are more likely to die in an accident. This is why after having your car insurance rate go down as an adult; it increases as you move past middle age into senior citizen status.
One other factor that can affect your car insurance rate is your credit rating. Why? Drivers with poorer credit scores suffer greater losses (33% above average) than drivers with good credit scores (19% below average).
While you have little control over your rate, exercise the control you do have. Drive safely and responsibly and take advantage of the discounts offered to you.
