Insurance website QuoteWizard just released its annual ranked list or Best and Worst Drivers by State for 2017, and it’s not looking good for those behind the wheel in the Golden State. Meanwhile, drivers in Rhode Island now have something to be proud of.
Continue reading for the full story.
The Full Story
The QuoteWizard study looks at data points on sampled incident data from QuoteWizard users, juxtaposed with the Federal Highway Administration fatality data. The data is then weighted for incident totals for each state with its occurrence percentage, with the rankings based on the sum of weighted means calculated from accidents, speeding tickets, DUIs, citations, and fatalities.
So then, what’s the state with the worst drivers? That would be California, which was second in 2016 but climbed to the top spot for 2017. QuoteWizard also points out that California includes half of the top 10 cities with the worst drivers in the country, with the absolute worst of the worst residing in Sacramento (although Los Angeles is mentioned as well). California drivers accumulated more tickets and more DUIs this time around, even grabbing the spot for worst standard for DUIs in the country, according to the study.
Meanwhile, the best drivers are in Rhode Island, so congrats on that, New England.
Rankings by State
|
Ranking (Worst) |
State |
|
1 |
California |
|
2 |
Minnesota |
|
3 |
Utah |
|
4 |
South Carolina |
|
5 |
Washington |
|
6 |
Nebraska |
|
7 |
Maine |
|
8 |
Virginia |
|
9 |
Idaho |
|
10 |
North Dakota |
|
11 |
Georgia |
|
12 |
Vermont |
|
13 |
Kansas |
|
14 |
Ohio |
|
15 |
Delaware |
|
16 |
New Jersey |
|
17 |
Colorado |
|
18 |
Oregon |
|
19 |
Connecticut |
|
20 |
Maryland |
|
21 |
Wyoming |
|
22 |
New Mexico |
|
23 |
Wisconsin |
|
24 |
New Hampshire |
|
25 |
North Carolina |
|
26 |
Louisiana |
|
27 |
Iowa |
|
28 |
Alabama |
|
29 |
Texas |
|
30 |
Missouri |
|
31 |
Massachusetts |
|
32 |
Indiana |
|
33 |
Pennsylvania |
|
34 |
Tennessee |
|
35 |
Alaska |
|
36 |
Alaska |
|
37 |
New York |
|
38 |
Montana |
|
39 |
Kentucky |
|
40 |
Arizona |
|
41 |
Oklahoma |
|
42 |
West Virginia |
|
43 |
Illinois |
|
44 |
South Dakota |
|
45 |
Nevada |
|
46 |
Arkansas |
|
47 |
Michigan |
|
48 |
Mississippi |
|
49 |
Florida |
|
50 |
Rhode Island |
Generally speaking, the last few years have seen a sizable increase in the number of auto accidents and car-related deaths, despite the advent of new semi-autonomous safety technologies like automatic braking. So why is that? The study points to the fact that Americans are driving more and more on average, with the additional time on the road equating to more opportunities for accidents, plus the fact that distracted driving continues to be a major problem.
So, about those autonomous cars…