Why the US will be one of the last developed countries to benefit from self-drive cars
We’re in a race — not just to build a safe self-drive car, but to implement them. On almost all forecasts, a society in which self-drive cars rule will be far more productive and safer than our current system, which sees c.1,800 deaths/ year in the UK alone. To get there, we need to hit two milestones:
- A self-drive car is built (hardware and software) that is indubitably safer than any manually controlled car;
- These cars are the only cars on the road — i.e. there are no more human-controlled cars on the road. It is broadly accepted that the self-drive/ manually-controlled mix will be far more unsafe than the end state.
Putting 1 to one side; what would 2 require? It will mean either removing an individual’s right to drive, or doing something that has the same effect (e.g. making manually-controlled cars prohibitively expensive) — both of which will likely require government intervention. How will electorates respond to this? Some people love driving!
How quickly 2 is achieved will be driven by government’s ability to make the required intervention, and this is a case of trading off <the rights of the individual> against <the aggregate safety of the population>. Remind you of another debate? Yep, gun laws.
My bet is that while driving isn’t a constitutional right, there will be a similarly large political battle as individuals defend their right to drive vs prioritising overall safety. The US bias towards individual liberty will mean they see human drivers on the road a long time after other countries. As a result, the US might be the first to crack the safe self-driving car, but it won’t see the full productivity and safety benefits until a long time after Europe, and maybe more importantly, China.
