Focusing on only deaths makes some sense since it’s the largest likely harm, but I will note that death is not the only outcome some people are afraid of on public transit; if you include lesser harms like being mugged or groped then that is going to tip the scales further towards driving since those things have a ~0% chance of happening while driving, and a small-but-probably-non-trivial chance (I haven’t looked it up) on transit.
If you want to bring those in (and I agree a more thorough analysis would) then you’d also want to bring in non-fatal automotive injuries; being in a collision can be pretty bad without killing you, and collisions are rare on public transit.
My guess is that a lot of the difference in perception-of-danger comes from how much control people feel they have in each situation. In a car I feel like I am in control, so as long as I don’t do stupid stuff I won’t get in an accident (fatal or otherwise), even though this is obviously not true as a random drunk driver could always hit me. Whereas on transit I feel less in control and have had multiple brushes with people who were obviously not fully in their right minds, one of whom claimed to have a gun; I may not have actually been in more danger but it sure felt like it.
Focusing on only deaths makes some sense since it’s the largest likely harm, but I will note that death is not the only outcome some people are afraid of on public transit; if you include lesser harms like being mugged or groped then that is going to tip the scales further towards driving since those things have a ~0% chance of happening while driving, and a small-but-probably-non-trivial chance (I haven’t looked it up) on transit.
If you want to bring those in (and I agree a more thorough analysis would) then you’d also want to bring in non-fatal automotive injuries; being in a collision can be pretty bad without killing you, and collisions are rare on public transit.
Oh I entirely agree.
My guess is that a lot of the difference in perception-of-danger comes from how much control people feel they have in each situation. In a car I feel like I am in control, so as long as I don’t do stupid stuff I won’t get in an accident (fatal or otherwise), even though this is obviously not true as a random drunk driver could always hit me. Whereas on transit I feel less in control and have had multiple brushes with people who were obviously not fully in their right minds, one of whom claimed to have a gun; I may not have actually been in more danger but it sure felt like it.