Accident costs
Accident costs (UK) arise from personal injury and property damage in a traffic accident and are part of the accident indicators in the field of local accident investigations , as they can be used to evaluate (traffic safety assessment) the accident on route sections and intersections. Accident costs measure the economic losses (external costs), summarize the number and severity of accidents and enable comparisons of road safety at a price level. The accident cost density (UKD) projects the average economic costs (in 1,000 € / a) onto individual road areas.
The Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt) calculates and publishes the economic costs of road accidents in Germany every year . The methodological basis for this assessment was laid in 1984 after a conceptual and empirical study by Krupp and Hundhausen. This concept was conceptually revised by Baum and Höhnscheid in 1999 and updated through empirical re-survey of the structural data. This concept has been retained since then. The accident cost calculation is currently based on a calculation model developed by Baum, Kranz and Westerkamp.
The BASt calculation model determines accident costs (euros per accident or personal injury), which are divided according to the severity of the personal injury (killed, seriously injured, slightly injured) or the accident category of property damage. By linking the severity-dependent accident cost rates with the frequency of their occurrence in the survey year, the economic costs of personal injury and property damage in road traffic can be calculated.
Breakdown of accident costs
- Reproduction costs
- is the cost of using medical, legal, administrative and other measures to create an equivalent situation as before the traffic accident. A distinction can be made between direct and indirect reproduction costs.
- Direct reproduction costs
- arise during the medical and professional rehabilitation of accident victims. Medical rehabilitation includes inpatient and outpatient treatment, transport and follow-up treatment for the accident victims. Vocational rehabilitation includes measures that serve to reintegrate or reintegrate accident victims into work.
- Indirect reproduction costs
- arise from the attempt to restore the legal situation (costs for the police, judiciary, insurance companies).
- Resource failure costs
- record the reductions in economic added value that arise from the fact that people injured or killed by accidents are no longer able to take part in the production process. In this respect, the injury or death of a person results in a reduction in future national product.
- Loss of added value outside the market
- include losses of added value that are not included in the national product. This includes the shadow economy as well as household production.
- Humanitarian costs
- include the consequences of accidents, such as psychological stress or the change in life planning, which are not included in the costs of reproduction and the costs of loss of resources.
- Traffic jam costs
- are costs due to lost time caused by traffic jams caused by accidents.
Road traffic accident costs using Germany as an example
According to the BASt calculation model, there are economic costs of EUR 31 billion in 2008 due to personal injury and property damage as a result of road traffic accidents in Germany. Compared to the previous year, the accident costs have fallen by approx. 3% (= € 970 million).
Of the total calculated economic accident costs, personal injury costs accounted for a total of € 14.04 billion in 2008; including fatalities € 4.64 billion, seriously injured € 7.83 billion and slightly injured € 1.57 billion. Overall, this corresponds to a share of 45% of the total costs. The share of costs for property damage was 55%, which corresponds to a cost volume of € 16.96 billion.
Cost rates for personal injury and property damage
| Cost rates for personal injury (per injured person) | |
|---|---|
| Killed | € 1,035,165 |
| Seriously injured | € 110,506 |
| Slightly injured | € 4,403 |
| Cost rates for property damage (per accident) | |
| Accident with fatalities | € 40,242 |
| Accident with seriously injured people | € 19,436 |
| Accident with minor injuries | € 12,775 |
| Serious accident with only property damage | € 19,035 |
| Other property damage accident (including alcohol accident) | € 5,550 |
The calculation model is used to determine the accident cost rates for personal injuries in order to estimate the consequences of the accident according to the severity of the personal injuries (killed, seriously injured, slightly injured). For property damage, the cost rates are determined based on the accident in order to estimate them based on the severity of the accident. The table on the right gives an overview of the cost rates per accident victim for personal injury and per accident for property damage.
Development of accident costs
| 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Personal Injury Costs | 15.23 | 14.73 | 14.88 | 14.04 |
| of which: costs for | ||||
| Killed | 5.46 | 5.16 | 5.08 | 4.64 |
| Seriously injured | 8.15 | 7.98 | 8.16 | 7.83 |
| Slightly injured | 1.62 | 1.59 | 1.64 | 1.57 |
| Cost of property damage | 16.25 | 16.22 | 17.09 | 16.96 |
| Total national accident costs | 31.48 | 30.95 | 31.97 | 31.00 |
Due to changes in the number of accidents, severity of accidents, costs in the health system and the income situation, which largely determine the economic loss from road traffic accidents, the calculation model used in the past from 1996 was revised. On the basis of the new model, the accident costs have been extrapolated since the data year 2005. The resulting “break” with the previous methodology must be accepted - in favor of a realistic depiction of the economic losses.
Compared to the previous year, the total accident costs fell by approx. 3% due to a decrease in both personal injury and property damage. The most important reason for this development is the again significant decrease in the number of fatally injured accident victims in 2008 by 472 compared to the previous year. The costs of fatalities in road traffic have decreased by almost 9% compared to the previous year. Contrary to the trend in personal injury, the cost of property damage has increased overall by 4.4% since 2005. The table on the right shows how accident costs have developed since the model was adapted in 2005. (Values in € bn)
External costs
Discussions about the costs and benefits of car traffic deal with the question of whether and to what extent the accident costs are borne by the general public.
See also
literature
- Herbert Baum, Karl-Josef Höhnscheid: Economic assessment of personal injury in road traffic, update for 1994 . Bergisch Gladbach 1996.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Frank Höfler: Verkehrwesen-Praxis, Volume 2: Verkehrstechnik . Bauwerk Verlag, Berlin 2006, ISBN 3-934369-53-7 , p. 199 .
- ^ Institute for Road Traffic: Safety of Traffic on Roads (SVS). Evaluation of road traffic accidents. Part 1: Management and evaluation of accident type plug-in cards. Accident research by insurers, Cologne 2003.
- ↑ Jürgen Gerlach, Jörg Ortlepp, Heiko Voss: Shared Space - A New Design Philosophy for Inner Cities? Accident research by insurers, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-939163-26-8 , p. 34 .
- ^ Rudolf Krupp, Gerd Hundhausen: Economic assessment of personal injury in road traffic . Federal Highway Research Institute, Bergisch Gladbach 1984.
- ↑ Herbert Baum, Karl-Josef Höhnscheid: Economic costs of personal injury in road traffic . Wirtschaftsverlag NW, 1999.
- ^ Baum, H .; Kranz, Th .; Westerkamp, U .: Determination of the economic costs of road traffic accidents in Germany . Reports from the Federal Highway Research Institute, 2009.
- ↑ a b Economic costs of road traffic accidents in Germany in 2008 ( Memento of the original from March 30, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , BASt research compact. Retrieved February 24, 2012.
