Seat Belt Laws and Fines by State

[DamianTV]

Government's role is protector of life and therefore should mandate helmets and seatbelts

And imprison people that do not floss.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

A driver with a seat belt is more likely to drive recklessly because he feels safer. A driver in a seat belt is also less likely to feel the full driving experience so he is less likely to have a close understanding of the driving experience. 2 factors when combined might mean more wrecks.

That's a lot of speculation. How do you come to the conclusion that someone in a seat belt is "less likely to feel the full driving experience..." That sounds like a load of horseshit to me. How the hell do you determine that? It sounds like you just made it up.

Than again, if there are passengers, it's important for them to wear a seat belt, for their safety, when the car is traveling at fast speeds. Of course, that isn't what speed belt laws are about. If a car is stopped for 20 minutes because of an accident, if an adult in the back seat takes his seat belt off, according to the law, he is an evil criminal!

Yeah, I know. Seat belt laws are ridiculous. But I still don't see why it's bad for a driver to wear a seat belt. I drive professionally in a regular-sized vehicle and I haven't noticed any difference between the way I drive with or without one.

 

[Keith and stuff]

That's a lot of speculation. How do you come to the conclusion that someone in a seat belt is "less likely to feel the full driving experience..." That sounds like a load of... How the hell do you determine that? It sounds like you just made it up.


Yeah, I know. Seat belt laws are ridiculous. But I still don't see why it's bad for a driver to wear a seat belt. I drive professionally in a regular-sized vehicle and I haven't noticed any difference between the way I drive with or without one.

A lot of evidence, stats and theories on both sides of the should there be an adult seat belt law in New Hampshire came out during the 2009 debate. After looking at the evidence, I wasn't able to tell if creating an adult seat belt law in NH would improve safety or decrease safety/make no difference.

Here is 1 of the theories that says people may drive worse if they wear a seat belt from Cato. There is more than 1 theory on this and I know a driving instructor that says he agrees with the theories. He even made his opinion on this known to the NH legislature in 2009. http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa335.pdf

There are numerous reasons why drivers shouldn't wear seat belts. If a driver is stopped on the interstate with a 20 minute back-up, a driver should be legally allowed to put on or take off a jacket. If a driver is stopped behind a train, a driver should be legally allowed to put on or take off a jacket. If a driver is handicapped and unable to drive safely or comfortably with a seat belt on, a driver should legally be allowed to drive without a seat belt. If a driver is very short or obese and cannot comfortably drive with a seat belt than a driver should be legally allowed to drive without a seat belt. If seat belt use significantly interferes with a driver's job, such as with a rural post office delivery driver, than a driver should be legally allowed to drive without a seat belt. In all of these cases and many more, wearing a seat belt is a BAD IDEA.

As for evidence that seat belt use kills people? Here is some evidence. http://www.oocities.org/galwaycyclist/info/seatbelts.html

Don't get me wrong, if someone wants to eliminate rights and enact legislation that has been show to kill drivers, children, pedestrians and cyclists, I likely have too much on my plate to deal with that. However, if that person moves to NH, gets elected and a seat belt bill ever comes up, I will educate that person on the facts that they support the killing of people and that killing innocent people is wrong. Or at least, shouldn't be encouraged by NH law like it is in every other state.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Wyoming has changed to primary enforcement.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Wyoming has changed to primary enforcement.

I cannot find much about that on the Internet. I saw that a Republican bill to do that passed the Senate but was stopped in the House in 2011.

Here is Bob Murphy's thoughts on a bunch of stuff, including seat belt laws. The part relating to seat belt laws starts at 11:40 in the video.


Seatbelts Cause More Pedestrian And Cyclist Deaths
February 27, 2010
http://www.libertariannews.org/2010/02/27/seatbelts-cause-more-pedestrian-and-cyclist-deaths/

While listening to a lecture on economics by Robert P. Murphy, he made note that economists actually found that seatbelt laws INCREASED fatalities among the general population.

I found this claim to be fairly incredible so I had to investigate for myself.

Of course, the information was buried amid a torrent of statist agitation, but I managed to find studies that backed up Murphy’s claim.

What happens is seatbelt laws cause drivers to drive more aggressively. Because drivers feel safer with quick acceleration and breaking while wearing seatbelts, accident rates actually increase.

All of the statist agitprop that calls for mandatory seatbelt laws only looks at deaths saved by calculating the accident rate compared to the fatality rate of vehicle occupants. This gives the misconception that seatbelts actually save lives, when indeed the exact opposite is true.

While it is true that you are much more likely to survive a car accident while wearing a seatbelt, the additional risk drivers take increases accident rates which wipes out any gains made by saving lives through mandatory seatbelt laws. In addition to this, it drastically increases fatalities of cyclists and pedestrians – all due to the increased risk taking of drivers.

When looking at society as a whole, seatbelts actually increase the number of fatalities involving motor vehicles.

This article in the British Medical Journal highlights the key findings:

Cyclists were the only group of road users in Britain whose death rate increased sharply during the 1990s,1 yet cycling was in decline throughout the decade.2 How could this happen, when attention on casualties was the most intense in the history of the bicycle? Perhaps a vision of the near future will be instructive . . .
…
It is worth pausing here to consider the meaning of “road safety.” The roads can get more dangerous, yet total deaths still fall. Compulsion to wear a seatbelt cut deaths among drivers and front seat passengers by 25% in 1983. But in the subsequent years, the long established trend of declining deaths in car accidents reversed, and by 1989 death rates among car drivers were higher than they had been in 1983. Evidently the driving population “risk compensated” away the substantial benefits of seatbelts by taking extra risks, putting others in more danger. This period saw a jump in deaths of cyclists (fig ​(fig1).1). Although temporary, the jump can be explained fully only by cyclists having adapted to a more dangerous road environment through extra caution, retreat, or giving up. Is it coincidence that the long decline in cycling began in 1983?
…
Between 1974 and 1982 cycling mileage in Britain increased 70%, but there was no increase in fatalities until the seatbelt law was introduced in 1983 (fig ​(fig1).1). The more cyclists there are, the more presence they have, the less individual danger there is. This truth is confirmed by experience in the Netherlands and Denmark, where cycling is far safer despite a tradition of segregation. All road users should gain. Pedestrians benefit because (skilful) cyclists are little threat to them and because a large increase in cycling should reduce traffic speeds and thus risks to all. Then there are the health benefits.

Economist John Semmens writes:

The plausibility of the aggressive driver hypothesis cries out for more research. For example, Hawaii, the state with the most rigorously enforced seat belt law and the highest compliance rate in the nation, has experienced an increase in traffic fatalities and fatality rates since its law went into effect in December 1985…

A recent statistical study of states with and without seat belt laws was undertaken by Professor Christopher Garbacz of the University of Missouri-Rolla. This study seems to support the altered driver behavior hypothesis. Dr. Garbacz found that states with seat belt laws saw decreases in traffic fatalities for those covered by the laws (typically drivers and front-seat passengers), but increases in fatalities for rear-seat passengers, cyclists, and pedestrians. Further, the patterns of changes in total traffic fatalities among the states showed no consistent relationship with the existence of a seat belt law in the state.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

A lot of evidence, stats and theories on both sides of the should there be an adult seat belt law in New Hampshire came out during the 2009 debate. After looking at the evidence, I wasn't able to tell if creating an adult seat belt law in NH would improve safety or decrease safety/make no difference.

Here is 1 of the theories that says people may drive worse if they wear a seat belt from Cato. There is more than 1 theory on this and I know a driving instructor that says he agrees with the theories. He even made his opinion on this known to the NH legislature in 2009. http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa335.pdf

There are numerous reasons why drivers shouldn't wear seat belts. If a driver is stopped on the interstate with a 20 minute back-up, a driver should be legally allowed to put on or take off a jacket. If a driver is stopped behind a train, a driver should be legally allowed to put on or take off a jacket. If a driver is handicapped and unable to drive safely or comfortably with a seat belt on, a driver should legally be allowed to drive without a seat belt. If a driver is very short or obese and cannot comfortably drive with a seat belt than a driver should be legally allowed to drive without a seat belt. If seat belt use significantly interferes with a driver's job, such as with a rural post office delivery driver, than a driver should be legally allowed to drive without a seat belt. In all of these cases and many more, wearing a seat belt is a BAD IDEA.

As for evidence that seat belt use kills people? Here is some evidence. http://www.oocities.org/galwaycyclist/info/seatbelts.html

Don't get me wrong, if someone wants to eliminate rights and enact legislation that has been show to kill drivers, children, pedestrians and cyclists, I likely have too much on my plate to deal with that. However, if that person moves to NH, gets elected and a seat belt bill ever comes up, I will educate that person on the facts that they support the killing of people and that killing innocent people is wrong. Or at least, shouldn't be encouraged by NH law like it is in every other state.

Great, talk to them like they're a 3-year-old, "Killing is wrong."

I'm not talking about the laws, though. I'm talking about seat belt use in general. Sure, no seat belt wearage should be made mandatory, but in general, is it a good idea or not? The law that says mail delivery drivers have to wear one is bad, but not a lot of people deliver mail. These specifics you offered don't cover a lot of people. I'm not going to argue with you about the law. I just don't see why people feel the need to discredit seat belts in general.

That Cato article is really long and doesn't immediately delve into the topic I'm interested in, so unless you can offer me something more condensed, I'm not likely to understand.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Great, talk to them like they're a 3-year-old, "Killing is wrong."

I'm not talking about the laws, though. I'm talking about seat belt use in general. Sure, no seat belt wearage should be made mandatory, but in general, is it a good idea or not? The law that says mail delivery drivers have to wear one is bad, but not a lot of people deliver mail. These specifics you offered don't cover a lot of people. I'm not going to argue with you about the law. I just don't see why people feel the need to discredit seat belts in general.

That Cato article is really long and doesn't immediately delve into the topic I'm interested in, so unless you can offer me something more condensed, I'm not likely to understand.

The specifics I mentioned cover the entire US driving population. There are interstates and railroad crossings all over the place. Check the article I posted or the several minutes of Bob Murphy talking about it for something shorter.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Great, talk to them like they're a 3-year-old, "Killing is wrong."

I'm not talking about the laws, though. I'm talking about seat belt use in general. Sure, no seat belt wearage should be made mandatory, but in general, is it a good idea or not? The law that says mail delivery drivers have to wear one is bad, but not a lot of people deliver mail. These specifics you offered don't cover a lot of people. I'm not going to argue with you about the law. I just don't see why people feel the need to discredit seat belts in general.

That Cato article is really long and doesn't immediately delve into the topic I'm interested in, so unless you can offer me something more condensed, I'm not likely to understand.

Here is something shorter:

Seatbelt-wearing causes a driver to feel safer.
This causes the driver to drive more recklessly.
This causes additional accidents.
The additional accidents are off-set by the additional protection of the safety belt, so the death rate doesn't go up.
EXCEPT FOR:
Some people are unaffected by the additional protection brought on by the belt-wearing trend. These include:
Pedestrians
Bicyclists
Motorcyclists
Non-wearers of safety belts.

This is the economic reasoning. The point which is most likely for you to shake your head at and dispute is the second: This causes the driver to drive more recklessly. However, it is true. You may say "Well, I never drive recklessly." That is false. There are different levels of reck. There's an infinite gradient between totally reck and totally reckless. When you're driving home from the hospital with your wife cradling your newborn baby, do you drive extra carefully? Yes. Maybe you just follow that slow-moving truck for 15 miles rather than passing it like you normally would. That that extra carefulness is even a theoretical possibility proves that at other times, you were less careful.

People have a certain level of safety they desire. If that level were higher, they would never even drive -- a patently dangerous act. If it were lower, well, you'd be living in Boston. Their level of preferred safety does not change just because they begin wearing a restraining belt. Thus, because they perceive themselves to be safer in the belt (and correctly so) but they did not have a burning desire to be safer, they can now fulfill other desires and still get the level of safety they want. They could, e.g.:

Spend more time with their family, or at work, by driving more quickly,
Concentrate more on audiobooks on interesting topics to them, rather keeping a focused watch for possible but unlikely road hazards,
Correspond with old friends,
Make themselves presentable and attractive,
Do other tasks in the car they would have previously had to take time away from the rest of their day to do,
Just relax and unwind after a hard day, rather than being all tense and super-alert.

They will absolutely, positively fulfill these other desires which rank higher on their value scale than extra super-safety. A person is always going to fulfill his highest desires first; the things he wants the most. This is undisprovable. So we know, absolutely, that increased seatbelt usage, if not accompanied by an increased desire for safety, will cause just what I said above: more reckless driving, more accidents, more dead pedestrians.

This is borne out by empirical studies as well, which have looked at the before-and-after of states as they adopted seat-belt laws. The data shows conclusively: number of accidents goes up, and pedestrian and bicyclist injuries and fatalities go up. As economists knew they would.

How could the roads actually be made safer? Require each car to have a large metal spike sticking out of the steering wheel.

 

[Keith and stuff]

 

[Keith and stuff]

Here's an email that a driving instructor sent to the NH senators in 2009 when some Democrats were talking about doing the unthinkable in NH, creating an adult seat belt law. Since that defeat, the Obama has stopped trying to bride NH into creating an adult seat belt law and many of the current Democrats are on record (thanks to Campaign for Liberty candidate surveys) saying they are against adult seat belt laws.

Subject: Read ASAP: Vital fatality statistics from NHTSA

Dear Senator,

I know time is precious and of the essence, so I'll get straight to the point.

Go here http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Trends/TrendsRestraints.aspx to view the traffic fatality trends from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration - Fatality Analysis Reporting System.

What you will see are startling statistics regarding the use and non-use of seat belts. From 1994 to 2007, fatalities of drivers wearing seat belts has steadily increased from 22,763 (49.1%) to 27,434 (62.1%). And fatalities of drivers NOT wearing seat belts has steadily decreased from 18,946 (40.9%) to 13,169 (29.8%).

Here's a highlighted screen-shot that makes it easier to read: http://www.academyofroadmastery.com/images/NHTSA/NHTSA-USA-stats-driver-fatalities-1.JPG

That right there should be enough to prove that mandating seat belts has failed to be a net gain in saving lives. In case it's not enough, on the same page are fatality statistics of 'occupants' wearing and not wearing seat belts.

...From 1994 to 2007, fatalities of occupants wearing seat belts has steadily increased from 9,642 (31.2%) to 12,252 (42.3%). And fatalities of occupants NOT wearing seat belts has steadily decreased from 18,636 (60.3%) to 14,390 (49.7%).

Here's a highlighted screen-shot that makes it easier to read. http://www.academyofroadmastery.com/images/NHTSA/NHTSA-USA-stats-passenger-fatalities-1.JPG

(These are not one time accurances, they are trends! Take another look if you didn't see it.)

These are shocking numbers and seem counter intuitive! There are two significant reasons that I see why this is so. They are:
1) The combination of airbags and seat belts, and
2) The false sense of security and control that comes from wearing a seat belt, thus higher speeds and greater risks that are taken.

I implore you to vote 'NO' on H.B. 383

Thirteen years of results are in and they are not good. Please do not jeopardize N.H. residents' lives by mandating seat belts!

Sincerely,

XXX XXX
Academy of Road Mastery

 

[PaulConventionWV]

Here is something shorter:

Seatbelt-wearing causes a driver to feel safer.
This causes the driver to drive more recklessly.
This causes additional accidents.
The additional accidents are off-set by the additional protection of the safety belt, so the death rate doesn't go up.

Evidence for this? Stats? How did you get the conclusion that the additional accidents are off-set EXACTLY by the additional protection of the safety belt. Also, where did you get the idea that simply having a seat belt on causes one to drive more recklessly? As I have mentioned, driving is part of my job, and this is not self-evident at all.

EXCEPT FOR:
Some people are unaffected by the additional protection brought on by the belt-wearing trend. These include:
Pedestrians
Bicyclists
Motorcyclists
Non-wearers of safety belts.

You have to establish your premise first, that the seat belt safety is EXACTLY off-set by the seat-belt danger. How can you even post something like this without any evidence?

This is the economic reasoning. The point which is most likely for you to shake your head at and dispute is the second: This causes the driver to drive more recklessly. However, it is true. You may say "Well, I never drive recklessly." That is false. There are different levels of reck. There's an infinite gradient between totally reck and totally reckless. When you're driving home from the hospital with your wife cradling your newborn baby, do you drive extra carefully? Yes. Maybe you just follow that slow-moving truck for 15 miles rather than passing it like you normally would. That that extra carefulness is even a theoretical possibility proves that at other times, you were less careful.

People have a certain level of safety they desire. If that level were higher, they would never even drive -- a patently dangerous act. If it were lower, well, you'd be living in Boston. Their level of preferred safety does not change just because they begin wearing a restraining belt. Thus, because they perceive themselves to be safer in the belt (and correctly so) but they did not have a burning desire to be safer, they can now fulfill other desires and still get the level of safety they want. They could, e.g.:

Spend more time with their family, or at work, by driving more quickly,
Concentrate more on audiobooks on interesting topics to them, rather keeping a focused watch for possible but unlikely road hazards,
Correspond with old friends,
Make themselves presentable and attractive,
Do other tasks in the car they would have previously had to take time away from the rest of their day to do,
Just relax and unwind after a hard day, rather than being all tense and super-alert.

You can't just claim these things without evidence. Where is the evidence that seat belt-wearing causes any of these actions? The only thing I ever drive with is the radio and sometimes a phone if I'm on the highway. I do this regardless of whether I'm wearing a seat belt or not. I only wear one when I'm on a particularly curvy patch of road anyway, or if I'm travelling at high speeds. I don't do these things AS A RESULT of wearing the seat belt.

They will absolutely, positively fulfill these other desires which rank higher on their value scale than extra super-safety. A person is always going to fulfill his highest desires first; the things he wants the most. This is undisprovable. So we know, absolutely, that increased seatbelt usage, if not accompanied by an increased desire for safety, will cause just what I said above: more reckless driving, more accidents, more dead pedestrians.

There are many instances in which thought experiments seem to be completely logically sound, and yet many of them don't apply in practice because of all of the variables that you may have left out in your analysis. You need actual, factual evidence.

This is borne out by empirical studies as well, which have looked at the before-and-after of states as they adopted seat-belt laws. The data shows conclusively: number of accidents goes up, and pedestrian and bicyclist injuries and fatalities go up. As economists knew they would.

How could the roads actually be made safer? Require each car to have a large metal spike sticking out of the steering wheel.

Now you're bringing up studies. Okay, where are they?

 

[PaulConventionWV]

Here's an email that a driving instructor sent to the NH senators in 2009 when some Democrats were talking about doing the unthinkable in NH, creating an adult seat belt law. Since that defeat, the Obama has stopped trying to bride NH into creating an adult seat belt law and many of the current Democrats are on record (thanks to Campaign for Liberty candidate surveys) saying they are against adult seat belt laws.

Nobody is arguing that mandating seat belts is a bad idea. But is it the seat belts themselves?

 

[MelissaWV]

Nobody is arguing that mandating seat belts is a bad idea. But is it the seat belts themselves?

People already posted why they personally feel they'd rather not wear them. Isn't that the point? That we be able to decide it for ourselves? Or is there some point to trying to convince everyone that seatbelts are awesome in their current incarnation?

 

[Keith and stuff]

Nobody is arguing that mandating seat belts is a bad idea. But is it the seat belts themselves?

I think everyone here agrees that mandating seat belt use is at least very bad, if not down right evil. State mandated seat belt use is state enforced death. Seat belts kill people. They kill drivers. They kill pedestrians. They kill bicyclists. While a pedestrian or 2 or 10 have annoyed me from time to time, I don't support the killing of pedestrians so I cannot support mandatory seat belt use.

 

[Peace Piper]

Pet Seat Belts Debated In New Jersey; Proposed Law Would Make Unrestrained Animals Illegal

The Huffington Post | By Meredith Bennett-Smith Posted: 09/21/2012 1:44 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/...bill-unrestrained-pets-illegal_n_1903817.html

A New Jersey Assemblywoman who wants to make seat belts mandatory for family pets is earning mixed reviews from her constituents and fellow lawmakers, according to The New Jersey Star Ledger.

Assemblywoman Grace Spencer (D-Essex) -- who owns a Pomeranian named A.J., as well as five cats and a rabbit, according to Bloomberg -- has introduced a bill that would require motorists to secure dogs and cats in a seat belt-like harness if they’re not being transported in crates.

Drivers found to be disobeying the proposed law would get a $20 ticket, the Ledger reports. Some could also be charged with animal cruelty, an offense with a fine of up to $1,000. If enacted, New Jersey would have the toughest animal seat belt law in the United States.

Spencer, a liability lawyer, said her bill was inspired by a fourth-grade class at a Newark charter school as well as the story of a small dog injured when its owner made a sudden stop. But as the Village Voice points out, there are other reasons why such a bill might make sense. Like unbuckled humans, unsecured pets can act as potentially dangerous "backseat bullets" if not buckled up during a car wreck..>>More​

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Evidence for this? Stats?

No need. It's apodictic.

How did you get the conclusion that the additional accidents are off-set EXACTLY by the additional protection of the safety belt.

That is an empirical happenstance, true. I only know it because of the empirical research. The offsetting effect could have been much more, or it could have been much less. Or it could have turned out that seat belts are a completely ineffective product that don't actually prevent deaths and injuries at all (zero offset). Or they could even do positive harm (negative offset).

So just forget that point. It doesn't really matter. It's not part of the main thread of the logic, just an interesting side note.

By the way, it's not "exactly," obviously. Just more or less.

Also, where did you get the idea that simply having a seat belt on causes one to drive more recklessly? As I have mentioned, driving is part of my job, and this is not self-evident at all.

I got it from logic. I logically demonstrated it to you.

Get on board the logic train!
Otherwise, what good's a brain?

You have to establish your premise first, that the seat belt safety is EXACTLY off-set by the seat-belt danger. How can you even know this without any evidence?

I couldn't, and you are exactly right to point this out. Again: forget line-item three. Erase. It's irrelevant.

This is the economic reasoning. The point which is most likely for you to shake your head at and dispute is the second: This causes the driver to drive more recklessly. However, it is true. You may say "Well, I never drive recklessly." That is false. There are different levels of reck. There's an infinite gradient between totally reck and totally reckless. When you're driving home from the hospital with your wife cradling your newborn baby, do you drive extra carefully? Yes. Maybe you just follow that slow-moving truck for 15 miles rather than passing it like you normally would. That that extra carefulness is even a theoretical possibility proves that at other times, you were less careful.

People have a certain level of safety they desire. If that level were higher, they would never even drive -- a patently dangerous act. If it were lower, well, you'd be living in Boston. Their level of preferred safety does not change just because they begin wearing a restraining belt. Thus, because they perceive themselves to be safer in the belt (and correctly so) but they did not have a burning desire to be safer, they can now fulfill other desires and still get the level of safety they want. They could, e.g.:

Spend more time with their family, or at work, by driving more quickly,
Concentrate more on audiobooks on interesting topics to them, rather keeping a focused watch for possible but unlikely road hazards,
Correspond with old friends,
Make themselves presentable and attractive,
Do other tasks in the car they would have previously had to take time away from the rest of their day to do,
Just relax and unwind after a hard day, rather than being all tense and super-alert.

You can't just claim these things without evidence.

Can so.
Just did.
It's logic.

Where is the evidence that seat belt-wearing causes any of these actions?

Don't need any. Do you know what "e.g." means, Paul?

The only thing I ever drive with is the radio and sometimes a phone if I'm on the highway. I do this regardless of whether I'm wearing a seat belt or not. I only wear one when I'm on a particularly curvy patch of road anyway, or if I'm travelling at high speeds. I don't do these things AS A RESULT of wearing the seat belt.

Thank you for this detailed minutia about your driving habits. Perhaps I am shocked at how reckless you are, listening to that crazy radio gadget. And you are a professional? Yikes! And then perhaps someone else is shocked at how paranoid and ridiculously over-cautious you are.

Careful isn't "yes or no." There is a spectrum of how risky people are willing to be, determined by a corresponding spectrum of how risk-adverse they are.

<- I stay home ----- I'll go out sometimes ----- I'm the median person ----- I love zipping through downtown Boston, ----- driving with my feet ----- blindfolded ->
<- I'm Monk's brother ----- I'm Mr. Monk ----- I have typical risk tolerance ----- I'm no chicken ----- I love risk ----- unhappy unless I almost died today ->

There are many instances in which thought experiments seem to be completely logically sound, and yet many of them don't apply in practice because of all of the variables that you may have left out in your analysis. You need actual, factual evidence.

My hospital "thought experiment" was simply to exemplate the obvious: there is a range of carefulness. You can always be more careful than you're being. Why aren't you? Because you have some tolerance for risk.

If you feel (rightly or wrongly, by the way) that you are in a range of safety and security you are comfortable with when driving and thinking about trigonometry, then why wouldn't you do it? You love those trig problems, they are something you value, why would you give that up? For what? For a tiny bit more safety on the road? You don't need it! You already have plenty of safety; all the safety you want! Or in your case, Paul: are you going to give up that Contemporary Christian Rock or talking to your mom? No way! Why would you?

Now if wearing a seatbelt doesn't make you feel safer, then in that case you won't drive any more carefully without it. But if it does, then you will. Not consciously; just a tiny bit, probably (depends how suicidally dangerous you think driving is, and how completely you think seltbelts eliminate the danger). Imperceptible, really. But multiply by hundreds of million of people and hundreds of billions of trips, and it adds up.

Unless I have made a logical error, all of this is indisputable, and indeed you have not disputed any of it (thus far), you have simply made empty statements stating your disbelief in it.

Now you're bringing up studies. Okay, where are they?

The studies don't matter. They just confirm what the logic says.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Do you agree with Mr. Holdorf that adult seat belt laws violate 4 Amendments to the US Constitution?

Repeal Seat-Belt Laws
by William J. Holdorf
http://archive.lewrockwell.com/orig3/holdorf1.html

State mandatory seat belt laws represent unabated tyranny on the march as each year law enforcement is expanded. Such laws infringe on a person's rights as guaranteed in the Fourth, Fifth, and the Ninth Amendments, and the Civil Rights section of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Seat belt laws are an unwarranted intrusion by government into the personal lives of citizens; they deny through prior restraint the right to determine a person's own individual personal health care standards for his own body, the ultimate private property. Not using a seat belt is a victimless, state-created crime that does not hurt or threaten anyone.

While seat belt use might save some people in certain kinds of traffic accidents, there is ample proof that in other kinds of traffic accidents some people have been more seriously injured and even killed because of forced seat belt use. Also, some people are alive today only because a seat belt was not used in certain kinds of traffic accidents. In those cases, the malicious nature of seat belt laws is revealed: by law, the victim is subject to a fine for not dying in the accident.

The fact is, the government has no constitutional authority to knowingly maim and kill some people just because the government hopes to save others merely by chance. The fact is, the government has no right to take chances with a person's body against his/her will; has no right to play Russian roulette with a person's life.

We do not allow our doctor to send the police over to our homes to check on whether or not we are following the doctor's individual personal health care orders and, if not, to issue a ticket and fine, so why do we allow politicians to send the police over to our personally owned autos, vans and trucks to see if we are following the politicians' health care orders, that is the use of a health care device, a seat belt harness?

The fact is, if a doctor attempted to force a person to use a health care device, take a drug, or have surgery to protect a person's individual personal health, the doctor would be subject to prosecution, and rightly so. Yet, politicians are doing exactly that same thing in forcing people to use a health care device, a seat belt harness, against a person's will, a device that can even be lethal in certain circumstances, all in violation of the Bill of Rights.

The right to determine one's own individual personal health care standards was confirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1991 when the Court ruled that it was unconstitutional for the management of Johnson Controls, a Milwaukee, Wisconsin, based battery manufacturing company, to forbid women of child-bearing age from certain higher paying jobs that exposed them to lead products, a known substance that is dangerous to a woman's reproductive organs. The Court ruled that such a decision must be made by each person, not management, regardless of any risks to a person's health, and regardless of any subsequent increase in the company's health care plan.

Further, in 1993, a federal appeals court ruled that the Americans With Disabilities Act applies to the obese. In so doing, the court upheld a $100,000 jury award to a 320-pound woman who sued her employer after she was told she could not return to work unless she lost weight. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had earlier declared obesity a protected right, even though obesity is not even mentioned in the Act and it is a self-inflected serious health hazard. With the appeals court ruling, that once, again, confirmed a person's constitutional right to determine his/her own individual personal health care standards. Stepping inside a motor vehicle cannot nullify such a constitutional right, notwithstanding politicians who think otherwise in supporting state mandatory seat belt harness laws.

Seat belts are an after-the-fact device. As such, not one penny of the millions of tax dollars annually spent in support of seat belt laws has ever prevented even one traffic accident. Further, because wearing a seat belt gives a person a certain sense of safety as promised by the government, studies have shown that drivers will tend to drive more recklessly. This is known as "risk compensation,." which is covered in more details in the 1995 book, Risk by Dr. Johan Adams, University College London, England.

We do not need to spend millions of tax dollars for more seat belt law enforcement, for more forced seat belt use, for more traffic accidents. Tax dollars spent for traffic safety should focus on achieving more responsibly educated drivers, and more safely built roads and vehicles in order to prevent accidents. Preventing traffic accidents will not only save lives but will save the cost of property damage and, most importantly, save our freedom.

There certainly is nothing wrong with voluntary seat belt use, as it is with all other kinds of individual personal health care suggestions and recommendations in life; however, there is a great deal wrong with all state mandatory seat belt harness laws.