There might be more reasons than just cheaper car insurance premiums to drive save, Flickr
A study conducted by LexisNexis and RGA Reinsurance Company set out to show that the more driving violations that a driver has on record, the lower their mortality rate.
The study separated the drivers into three groups: those with no driving violations, those with minor driving violations, and those with major violations. Those with major violations (such as DUIs and excessive speeding violations) led to a heightened risk of death by as much as 71% in comparison to someone with a minor or “no violation” driving record. Four or more major violations on file doubled the risk of death.
After comparing 7.4 million driving records and identifying 73,000 deaths in those records, they were also able to draw these other conclusions:
The study did find also some interesting gender factors in driving:
Women were found to have cleaner driving records than men, but those who did have a bad driving record and had one major offense on record had a 100% greater risk of earlier death when compared to a woman who did not have any major offenses on record. Additionally, the study found that men with major driving offenses on record only had a 61% higher mortality risk than men who didn’t have any.
So why the difference between men and women? That question still hasn’t been answered, and it’s like it won’t be for a very long time. One factor that may be fairly taken into account is that women generally score lower in spatial skills tests than men. A study from the University of Giessen in Germany found women were worse at assessing distances and spaces, this is most likely due to the fact that men have more rods in their eyes than women do. The corneal rods allow men to have better peripheral vision than women, which is one reason why men are typically known as better ‘racers’ and is perhaps why men can hang curves tighter and easier than a woman can.
Women essentially have ‘tunnel vision’ when compared to men—something that has been attributed to pure evolution dating back to the days of cavemen. Women didn’t have the need to look far distances and survey a large area like men did, they only needed to be able to focus on a certain point in front of them. This is for a couple reasons—one, the women were ‘gatherers’ while their male counterparts were hunters. So women needed to find food—nuts, berries, fruits—while men were hunters and needed the ability to scan a large area for prey and also watch out of the corner of their eyes for any other prey or for any threats. This is similar to men in some tribes learning to sleep with their eyes open at night so they could react quicker to threats. Women just needed to see the path right in front of them that would take them to where they were used to scouring for food, using the same routes repeatedly, and focused on taking care of children.
While insurers are not really relying on the ‘hunter and gatherer’ theory when it comes to assigning actuarial data to policyholders and having to figure out who presents what risks. But they are aware that women have fewer catastrophic claims, accidents, and major violations, whereas men are likely to have more reckless driving violations, alcohol and drug related violations, major speeding violations, and more accidents in general. They’ve also found that age of course plays a large part in presented risks—men are essentially considered ‘young drivers’ until they’re 30 years old or until they marry, whichever comes first.
Thus, insurers must have realized that men under 30 are typically more likely to have accidents, make claims, and participate in risk taking behavior—men typically pay more for insurance than women. In fact, the Insurance Information Institute has estimated that men pay almost $20K more over their lifetime for auto insurance.
Women, however, don’t present these risks for as long in life and it appears insurers adhere to the old adage of ‘girls mature faster than boys.’ Women aren’t rated as young drivers once they turn 25, seeing a large reduction in premium, and can even be rated as an adult driver if they marry before 25. That may not sound like too much of a difference until you look at it this way—an 18 year old female can be rated as an adult driver if she marries, but yet a 29 year old man can still be rated as a young driver if he hasn’t married. To insurers, it appears that even ten
years isn’t enough to make up whatever happens in that ten year gap.
For men and women though, once they marry and have children, insurers have found that risky driving behavior and claims history goes down greatly. This is probably attributed to people driving more safely if they have children in the car, and some perhaps driving more responsibly once married on the mere fact of perhaps ‘settling down’ or being more careful so that one spouse is around for the other one.
Whether married or with children, there’s no arguing with the information found in this study—and it spans the driving records of men and women with all kinds of different ages, marital status, dependents, or vehicles. This clearly shows the bottom line is that although men may participate in more risky behavior and overall have a lower mortality rate than women where driving is concerned, that ANYONE, male or female, is likely going to die much earlier if they have a record of major violations and accidents, no matter how long ago it was.
“Our research shows that motor vehicle records can be a reliable indicator of lifestyle risk for insurance applicants,” said a VP at LexisNexis,
Elliot Wallace. This brings to question if driving records could be of some indication of one’s lifestyle or personal attitude. If this study holds any ground, it may be possible in the future for driving records to be used across all lines of insurance, including life and health insurance premiums, when assessing risk factors and life insurance premiums.
Image via Flickr.
