Women drivers: Everything you know is wrong (maybe)

When my husband and I go somewhere together, he drives.

And since we go practically everywhere together, I hardly ever drive — except to work. I couldn’t tell you why we do this. It’s just been that way for so long that I automatically settle into the passenger seat without thinking about it.

But is that the best arrangement for all involved? It’s practically an accepted axiom of life. Men are better drivers than women. Most men believe this with the fervency of a new religious convert. Even women believe it. In polls, only about 25 percent of women rate their driving skills as better than men’s. But is it true?

As my husband likes to remind me, I’ve had way more accidents than he has — more than half a dozen fender benders, about half of those in my driveway. I tend to hit things in my immediate proximity at slow rates of speed because I misjudge their distance. My dinged-up bumpers bear testament to this. My cheeks burn when he gives me that frazzled “women drivers” look when I can’t explain why the object I hit seemed so much further away.

He never dings things or has accidents, except, as I like to remind him, for the time he totaled his car, just weeks after paying it off, by running it into a tree. He did this in his 20s when he was stone-cold sober. He was lucky to walk away alive and fortunate he didn’t kill anyone.

Who is the better driver? Statistics say I’m the safer one. Two times more male drivers were involved in fatal accidents in North Carolina — a little more than 900 — than female drivers in 2009, according to the state department of transportation. Insurance companies think so, too. The median insurance rate for men was $765 in 2010 for a six-month policy. For women it was $698.

And no, guys, young male driver stats aren’t skewing these safety numbers for the rest of you. In every age group from 16 to 70, male drivers are at least twice as likely to be involved in a fatal vehicle crash as women, according to MSN Autos. Men are more than three times as likely as women to be cited for reckless driving, DUI and seatbelt violations. They’re caught speeding at 1.75 the rate women are, and they are cited for failure to yield and stop sign/signal violations at 1.5 times the rate of women.

Most studies of this question therefore conclude that I should take the keys from my husband to give my family a better shot at surviving a car trip. But there is a catch. Men drive 75 percent more miles than women. A study by Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health in 1998 found that when you lump all traffic accidents together, both the fatal ones to the fender benders, men come out on top with 5.1 accidents for every million miles driven to 5.7 for women.

Of course, if men drive 74 percent more miles than women but have 100 percent more fatal accidents than we do, they’re still arguably more deadly.

Since the John Hopkins study only counted reported accidents, I’m willing to concede that the number of accidents for women could actually be higher if you count, say, minor collisions with the garage door or the times I’ve whacked my side mirror on something and had to have it worked on.

Most studies of driving concede that men have better spatial and situational awareness behind the wheel and are more likely to pass their driver’s tests on the first try. It’s their aggressiveness behind the wheel that tends to get them in trouble.

My husband, when confronted with the weight of this statistical evidence against him and his gender last week, conceded that women are, in fact, probably the better drivers. We’ve taken three family car trips since then, and each time, he’s made a beeline for the driver’s seat.

What that means, you can interpret for yourself.

This article appears in Apr 5-11, 2011.