alan@sun.uucp (Alan Marr, Sun Graphics) (07/30/85)
I think that offering insurance coverage for two options (user and non-user) would be a good idea. It is claimed that it is easy to cheat. In most accidents it should be easy to tell. A significant number of non-users end up dead. Others are unconscious. Some are thrown clear of the car, or across the car to the other side. Others would be too dazed to think of buckling up afterwards. The nature of the injuries would often be decisive. For example, if a person's forehead is caved in from hitting the dash the force of the accident would probably cause belt bruises on wearers. Showering glass particles would probably leave a shadow where the belt is. Patterns of blood on clothing and the belt would indicate a lot to an investigator. Even if people did successfully cheat some of the time, the benefit in terms of lowered premiums to belt wearers would still be sufficient to be desirable. I am sure the insurance companies have statistics on how much cost is incurred in paying to people in accidents who are wearing seatbelts vs. those not wearing. This would form the basis for differential premiums, which I think would be rather large. Those carrying "belted" policies who are injured while not wearing belts could be paid out at a rate proportional to the differential. Policies could be offered with four options: (1) unbelted driver and passengers, (2) belted passengers, unbelted driver, (3) belted driver, unbelted passengers, and (4) belted driver and passengers. The same differential payouts could apply, although I think it would be advisable to only offer two options depending on the driver wearing or not wearing a belt and pay out for passengers regardless, since a passenger often would not know what kind of policy the driver carries and could in any case be purposely mislead by the driver. The argument that requiring occupants to wear seatbelts infringes on their freedom is often buttressed by analogy to risky things like hang-gliding. While I am less in favour of seatbelt legislation as time goes by, (especially when choices can be offered as in insurance options), I would like to refute the argument. The analogy is not strictly applicable since it is impossible to hang-glide without hang-gliding but it is possible to sit in a moving car wearing seat-belts. The point that the foolishness of non-users costs all of us has not been made strongly enough. By far the greatest cost to society is the loss of productivity and creativity from the injured and the dead. Of course, anyone has the right to be unproductive and uncreative. Seatbelts on drivers help them maintain their position at the controls and therefore lessen the chance that they will lose control after primary collisions or unforeseen gyrations (i.e. skids). Thus they lessen the chance that they will hit oncoming traffic or pedestrians thereby injuring or killing innocent bystanders.