Posted by David Sheman on Thursday, April 29, 2004 at 12:04PM :
In Reply to: Re: Seatbelt Fatalities (bigger doh) posted by Russ Roth on Thursday, April 29, 2004 at 9:25AM :
The seatbelt laws are not because there are so many morons who can't think for themselves, but because "we" have decided that the government should be thinking for them. I agree that we should wear seatbelts, but I don't see how it's any business of the government. The arguments about traffic injuries raising insurance rates don't make sense, because for everybody who would have been severely injured but wasn't because he was wearing a seatbelt (thus saving medical costs), there's somebody else in a worse wreck that would have died but but ended up crippled thanks to the seatbelt. It's a lot cheaper to bury somebody than to treat their severe and chronic injuries. It's the insurance companies that pushed for seatbelt laws, motorcycle helmet laws, and all kinds of automotive safety regulations ranging from padded dashboards to multiple air bags, but now that they have them I haven't seen insurance rates dropping. Could it be that although seatbelts do save lives, they do not actually reduce medical costs since live injured people are more expensive than dead people?