FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CAR Research Identifies Opportunities to Reduce Risky and Impaired Driving Fatalities in the U.S.
International and state-level benchmarking highlights approaches to seat belt use, speeding, alcohol and drug-impaired driving, and fatigued driving.
ANN ARBOR, MI – New research from the Center for Automotive Research (CAR) finds that the United States continues to experience substantially higher motor vehicle fatality rates than several peer nations, highlighting opportunities to strengthen policies, enforcement practices, data collection, and public awareness efforts aimed at reducing risky and impaired driving.
The new report, “Behavioral Safety – A Global Benchmark to inform U.S. Policy, Enforcement, and Public Awareness,” compares U.S. road safety outcomes with those of six peer nations, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and South Korea. The study also examines differences among U.S. states to identify approaches associated with lower fatality rates.
Between 2016 and 2023, the U.S. reported, on average, approximately twice the motor vehicle fatalities per capita of the six peer nations examined. Even after accounting for distance traveled, the U.S. averaged 38 percent more fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled than the comparison countries.
“Reducing roadway fatalities requires more than identifying the behaviors that contribute to crashes,” said Elizabeth Krear, President and CEO of the Center for Automotive Research. “This research looks at what governments in the United States and abroad are doing differently and where the evidence points to opportunities for improvement. The findings reinforce the importance of combining sound policy with effective enforcement, public awareness, and better data.”
The research examines five major behavioral safety factors: unrestrained occupants, speeding, alcohol-impaired driving, drug-impaired driving, and fatigued driving.
Key findings include:
- Unrestrained occupants remain the largest contributor relative to other risky and impaired driving behaviors. In 2024, 12,793 people lost their lives in U.S. crashes involving unrestrained occupants. States with primary seat belt enforcement generally report lower shares of unrestrained occupant fatalities than states with secondary enforcement or no adult seat belt law.
- Speeding remains a persistent safety challenge. Speeding-related deaths represented an average of 28.6 percent of U.S. motor vehicle fatalities from 2010–2024. This analysis highlights automated speed enforcement, appropriate speed limits, administrative license suspension for severe speeding, and sustained enforcement efforts as areas warranting further consideration.
- Alcohol impairment accounts for a disproportionately high share of U.S. traffic deaths. From 2016–2024, alcohol-impaired fatalities represented approximately 30 percent of U.S. motor vehicle fatalities, on average more than twice the average share among the peer nations studied. States that permit and utilize sobriety checkpoints reported lower alcohol-impaired fatality rates than states where checkpoints are prohibited.
- Drug-impaired driving is becoming increasingly complex. Drug-impaired driving contributed to 4,577 U.S. deaths in 2024, while differences in testing, detection, reporting, and legislation make the full scope difficult to measure.
- Fatigued driving is likely underreported. Reported fatigue-related fatalities account for a relatively small share of U.S. traffic deaths, but limitations in detection and reporting make it difficult to determine the true scale of the problem.
Rather than identifying a single solution, CAR’s analysis points to the value of coordinated countermeasures. Across several behavioral safety categories, jurisdictions with stronger outcomes frequently combine legislation, meaningful enforcement, public education, and sustained evaluation.
The report also highlights the importance of improving consistency in how emerging and difficult-to-measure risks, particularly drug impairment and fatigued driving, are detected and reported. More standardized data could help policymakers and safety organizations more accurately assess the effectiveness of future interventions.
“This benchmarking demonstrates that roadway safety outcomes are influenced not simply by whether a policy exists, but by how consistently it is implemented, enforced, communicated, and evaluated,” Krear said. “Looking across both U.S. states and international peers provides an opportunity to learn from approaches that are producing better outcomes and determine how those lessons may apply domestically.”
The full report is available at https://www.cargroup.org/publication/behavioral-safety/.
Organizations interested in exploring how these trends may affect their business, supply chain, investment strategy, or policy environment can also engage CAR for independent research, scenario planning, economic impact analysis, and strategic industry insights.
Center for Automotive Research
The Center for Automotive Research (CAR) is an independent, non-profit organization conducting industry-driven research and analysis. Focusing on critical areas like Energy & Sustainability, Manufacturing & Technology, and Labor, Economics, and Policy. CAR has been a trusted resource for the automotive industry for over twenty years. www.cargroup.org
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