Wear Seat Belt Essay

Seat belt usage is a struggling problem today through out the United States. It is also lower then any other industrialized nation in the world. The best way to prevent a death in a motor vehicle accident is to wear a seat belt. Everybody has their opinions on safety belts and the laws that go with them, but until they prove them harmful, people recommend for occupants to wear it while in a vehicle. Still today people want it to be a national law for people to buckle up. Estimations from people all over the country prove that seat belts really help save lives. But also some safety belts have failed and have cause people to get trapped in the car. For instance, if someone happens to run off a bridge and go into the water, they would have to

get out of the car fast so him or her would not drown. Unless they prove that seat belts are harmful, people recommend that individuals behind the wheel should wear a seat belt. Some states have made laws about buckling up. Still drivers argue about whether or not it should be a nationwide law.
Seat belts were introduced in cars informally in the 1930s. There were a few types of seat belts. The most common one, which we use today, is a three-point seat belt. There are two types of collision, secondary and primary. Secondary is the impact of a vehicle and an object or another vehicle. Primary is the impact of an occupant with some part of the vehicles interior. It depends on the accident whether or not the occupant would be injured or not. (“Seat Belts”) From 2007 to 2008, NH’s seat belt usage went up five percentage points. “In 2003, the last year for which we have complete data, an estimated 42,643 people were killed in motor vehicle crashes.” And those 42,643 people were not wearing a seat belt. So some people are thinking that if they make wearing a seat belt a law, more people will start wearing it because some people always obey the law. That could almost cut the injury number in half. Most of all the occupants that are in a car crash are unrestrained ("Seat Belt Laws Should Be Enforced."). The article “Primary Seat Belt Enforcement Laws Are Beneficial” by Kathryn Higgins asserts that “Unbelted vehicle occupants frequently injure other occupants, and unbelted drivers are less likely than belted drivers to be able to control their vehicles.” NHTSA estimated that from 1975 through 2007, seat belts almost saved 242,000 people that were in a serious car accident. Drivers who do not buckle up usually tend to drive at high-risk behaviors such as speeding or driving under the influence. The drivers who have that habit have a bigger chance at having a fatal wreck. From 1998 through 2007, more than 820,000 drivers were involved in a wreck and more than 316,000 died. Fifty three percent of the people that died were not buckled up. Teen drivers can also be considered high-risk drivers since they have little experience on the roads. “Primary enforcement seat belt laws remain the best way to raise and maintain high seat belt use rates.” Since some states have made laws to buckle up, the use rate of using seat belts went up 18 percentage points in almost one year. Enacting a nation wide seat belt law would help save lives and would also save a lot of money. It would cost nothing to pass the law (Higgins).
Click it or ticket is coordinated through NHTSA and the nonprofit Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS).

There is not a federal law to wear a seat belt, but forty-nine states in America have a mandatory seat belt law. There is a debate whether or not there should be a national law about wearing a seat belt. Since him or her could still die wearing a seat belt, someone would not think there should be a law, but it still helps in some wrecks to save from being injured. It would be up to the occupants to wear one or not. Baby’s should always be in a car seat and buckled up at all times while in a vehicle. People say that not wearing seat belts is actually safer than wearing one. “Unfortunately, sometimes the crash force is too great and even a seat belt cannot prevent injury or death.” In a high speed collision the seatbelt could cause injuries to the chest, abdomen, or neck. Wearing one could cause an injury, but also it could consider him or her being able to live or not. Some people argue about the malfunctions of seat belts so they would rather take their chances. In the states that do have mandatory law for seat belts, school busses should also have seat belts in them. But in the past school bus accidents, most of the students where fine. The bus driver (which has a seat belt) was the one that was commonly injured. But since it’s the law, everyone should have one and it not just be mandatory for busses. (“Seat

Belts”)
Not only does having a wreck hurts yourself and your family but it also can cost a lot of money towards the nation. Jeffrey Runge says “The annual cost to our economy of all motor vehicle crashes is $230.6 billion dollars in Year 2000, or 2.3 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product.” Therefore it can hurt a little bit of everybody if someone gets in to a wreck. Too many people are getting injured in car accidents. The accidents can take peoples life and cause their family to spend a lot of money. Therefore, people around the world should start to encourage people to wear their seat belt. People are taking their own risk at not wearing one. Some people say they don’t work. But the data of people that do not wearing a seat belt has more deaths, which proves that seat belts usually work (Runge). “NHTSA calculated that the lifetime cost to society for each fatality is over $977,000, over 80 percent of which is attributed to the lost workplace and household productivity.” In 2007, if occupants wore there seat belt, more than five thousand lives and billions of dollars could have been saved. One critically injured survivor could cost an average of one million dollars. In just year 2000, seat belts could have prevented over 142,000 injuries. (Runge)