Students top the list of accident-prone drivers, but beware doctors and lawyers.

The number of female professional drivers on our highways is steadily increasing. I find my female counterparts to be outstandingly proficient, professional and safety conscious. However, together with this observation comes the memory of women drivers taking it on the chin from comedians and male drivers for being the worst drivers on the road. Faced with this obvious contradiction, I decided to look into the matter. Can a case be made to support or refute these old stereotypes?

For assistance, I turned to a study conducted by the Quality Planning Corp., a San Francisco-based company founded almost 20 years ago to provide data to the auto insurance industry. Gender did not enter into QPC’s equation. Instead, it studied more than 1 million drivers in an attempt to determine which professions and occupations produce the greatest number of accident-prone speeders and outright aggressive drivers.

As a group, students consistently scored highest as the most likely to both speed and be involved in an accident. No surprise there, especially when you consider that the overwhelming majority of students are under the age of 21. Data compiled by QPC reveals that the most accident-prone age group is 16-24, after which accidents drop from 28 to 16 for 21 to 30 year olds and continue to decrease until the 61-70 age bracket, at which point the accident rate starts to climb back up to about the same rate as that of the youngest drivers.

The next four occupations completing the list of five most likely to have accidents were medical doctors, attorneys, architects and real estate agents. Homemakers (gender not a factor) came in at the bottom of the list of accident-prone, as did politicians, pilots, firefighters and farmers.

However, when the study shifted from the accident-prone to which group would be more likely to collect speeding tickets, the top five list changed radically. Students still found themselves in first place with architects close behind, but manual laborers, enlisted military personnel and politicians replaced the doctors, attorneys and real estate agents.

It seems strange: Although doctors, attorneys and real estate agents are not great speeders, they do crash more often than most of us mortals. Conversely, politicians, who seem to really like speeding, somehow manage to avoid crashes.

Looking to the age factor, we find that the very young driver (aged 16-20) leads the pack in both summonses and accidents, but drivers aged 81 and over have almost as high an accident rate while committing far fewer moving violations.

After looking over the statistical results of the study, QPC’s founder and president, Dr. Daniel Finnegan, commented: “Fortunately for those unlucky enough to be involved in an accident, individuals from two professions which are most helpful after such an accident – doctors and lawyers – are the most likely to be on the scene.”

That sure is comforting, but what about those infamous women drivers?

According to this study, it seems that educated professionals of both genders are most likely to be involved in accidents. Unless dressed for success and on their way to perform surgery, represent a client in court or close a real estate deal, the much maligned woman driver does not qualify as a primary player among the speeding and accident-prone.

Case dismissed.

Until next time, keep the greasy side down and the shiny side up. Drive safely.

Guy Bourrie has been hauling on the highways for 20 years. He lives in Washington, Maine, and can be reached at [email protected].