Originally Posted by
Mats
I just finished reading "Traffic," by Tom Vanderbilt. It's a GREAT book; beautifully written, compelling arguments. It discusses topics like traffic jams, driver behavior, road design, and--above all--safety.
The last chapter looks at automobile accidents compared to the risk of terrorism. To put it in perspective: more people die each month in auto accidents than from the September 11th attacks.
Vanderbilt argues that the social psychology of risk comes into play: auto accidents are so prevalent that they are routine. The statistical rarity of terrorism is what makes it so much more threatening.
Imagine if we took all of the money spent on puffer machines, plastic bags, shoe inspections, and gate screening and spent it on road safety?
Above all, the hassle factor prevents travelers from traveling by air. If the TSA's antics mean that more people will travel by car, they put more lives at risk.
Each MONTH? The death toll from the 9/11 attacks (~3000 people) is approximately the number of people who die in road accidents every
day.
Kudos to Vanderbilt for writing a book about it, but I've been pointing out to the TSA for years that more lives would be saved if they just shut the whole airline security thing down, let terrorists bring down an airliner every month, and the funds saved used to instead bring down traffic fataliities by just 1%. None of the "logic" behind the TSA's priorities makes any sense.