Mike_TX

You'll always get an argument on topics like this one. This guy suggests that horsepower and speed are causing the accident rates to rise, but he hasn't checked his facts. It's a little-advertised fact that highway deaths per capita have been falling for years. This even according to the IIHS, which is a liberal insurance industry mouthpiece. What they like to trumpet is the rising "death toll", but they fail to relate it to the faster rise in the number of drivers and cars on the road.

It's like the old "speed kills" myth. Speed can contribute to certain accidents (due to longer braking times, etc.), and increase severity (due to impact forces), but you can expect to be just as dead if you hit a bridge abutment at 55mph as you will if you hit it at 75.

Statistics are often skewed by using speed as a "contributing factor" to accidents. That just means the car was moving at the time it happened. Heck, you could just as accurately say breathing was a contributing factor, since the drivers were both breathing at the time.

There is a Latin phrase that sums it up - "Post hoc ergo propter hoc", meaning that just because something follows something else does not mean the first thing caused the second one. (The rooster crowing doesn't cause the sun to rise.)

Horsepower doesn't cause accidents ... people cause accidents.

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dwboston

No kidding Mike, but facts don't stop activists and lobbyists from trying to get "nanny state" type laws enacted for the benefit of their clients and constituents. Rationally there isn't really a connection between HP and accidents or fatalities. But a weakened domestic auto industry may not be able to fight this stuff off forever.

Nothing personal, but I find it kind of comical that you and NavyDoc hang out here so much after getting rid of your Acuras for Lexuses. Hell, his Lexus has been in the shop for 6 weeks but he'll post every 5 minutes telling us how great it is and how Acura sucks.

LukeaTron

I don't have any numbers so I can't say anything with any authority here but causation isn't necessary for correlation. If you were to look at the numbers and see that cars with more than 300 hp (to pick a number) were involved in a higher rate of accidents than those bellow that cut off, what does it matter (from the insurance company's point of view) if the power output of that car was a causative factor in those accidents?

From their point of view, the power output of your vehicle is a predictor of your chances of being involved in an accident and that's all they need to know. Of course there are other factors that go into the whole equation, your age, where you live, your driving record and so on but that doesn't remove all the indicated risk of the high output vehicle.

Mike_TX

I know, Boston, but I remain a fan of the RL (and Acura, for that matter, having owned a TL, RL and MDX). I also fully expect to own another one, if they alter their design direction just a tad.

I certainly don't think Acura sucks at all. My RL was probably the most overall competent car I've owned in years. Not perfect, or I'd still have it, but it had more things "right" about it than any car in recent memory.

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Mike_TX

As a 33-year veteran of the insurance industry, I can tell you there is more than one factor involved in these considerations.

For example, luxury sedans with more than your cited 300hp are not involved in accidents at a higher rate than cars with lower hp ... quite the contrary, in fact. Insurance underwriters like luxury sedans.

But sports cars or "performance cars" with more than 300hp are indeed considered more risky. The reason, though, is that these cars are often owned by younger drivers, drivers who tend to show off, or race, or otherwise drive recklessly or aggressively. And the power-to-weight ration is usually greater in these cars than in lux sedans.

The bottom line, though, is the rate at which cars are involved in accidents, and the insurance losses associated with them. Corvettes and WRX STi's get higher rates than RL's because they're a greater underwriting risk, not because of their horsepower ratings. Even if the RL got bumped to 350hp, it would still be a better underwriting risk than a pimped-out Civic.

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LukeaTron

Hah. Yeah, that's pretty much exactly what I was trying to convey. I guess what you were saying in your earlier post is "yes, insurance companies see bigger engines as an increased risk factor even though the bigger engine isn't the cause of the accident." I agree with that statement.