Teen drivers safest in New York; South Dakota ranked last

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Teen drivers in the Empire State seem to fair the best in terms of safety whereas South Dakota teens are at a higher risk for injury and even death, a recent study by a personal finance website showed.

WalletHub analyzed information from all 50 states using three categories – safety conditions, economic environment and driving laws. Those categories consisted of 16 metrics that were scored on a 0 to 100 scale with 100 being the most favorable conditions for teen drivers.

New York lead the pack with a total score of 74.97 while South Dakota came in at the bottom with a score of 23.

With an average of 220 teens killed in car crashes each month, Wallethub wanted to give parents and teens more information about the conditions seen in their states. Wallethub also indicated that car crashes are the leading cause of death among teens age 16 to 19. That group is also among the highest risk for crashes.

Source: WalletHub

 

When looking at people age 16 to 24 who are involved in crashes, the economic impact is also significant. Wallethub indicated that although that age group only accounts for about 14 percent of the population, they make up about a third of all costs from car crash injuries.

The other states that made the top 10 in terms of safety and economic indicates include Oregon, Illinois, Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Washington, Louisiana, Rhode Island and California.

The study also gave the top best and worst in several categories including lowest premium, fewest teen driver fatalities, lowest number of teen DUIs, lowest average cost of car repairs and best states with teen driver graduated driver license program laws.

For the category of fewest teen driver fatalities per teen population, Delaware came in at number one followed by Rhode Island, New Jersey, Massachusetts and California. The states that had the most teen driver fatalities per teen population were West Virginia which ranked at 46 followed by Alabama, Mississippi, North Dakota and Wyoming.

In the category of lowest number of teen DUIs per teen population, Alabama was ranked number one followed by Illinois, Delaware, New York and Louisiana. The states that had the highest number of teen DUIs per teen population were Wyoming which ranked at 46 followed by Montana, Wisconsin, Nebraska and South Dakota.

Speaking of safety, the Monospace shifter in some Fiat Chrysler vehicles has come under some scrutiny since the death of actor Anton Yelshin. Check out this TFLcar video of a demonstration of this shifter on a Jeep Grand Cherokee: