Death AND Taxes

Tax Time = More Highway Fatalities I hope that all my readers have survived tax day which fell this year on Tuesday, April 17 due to celebration of Patriots Day in Maine and Massachusetts. It is a bit surprising, but actually makes sense when you think about it, that new research shows that there is an upswing in fatal traffic accidents on tax filing day. According to a report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association deaths from highway accidents were, on average, 6 percent higher on each of the tax filing days in the last 30 years compared to a day during the week prior and a week later. The study looked at data from the IRS and the NHTSA from 1980 to 2009 and showed that there was an average of 226 fatal crashes for each of the 30 tax days, but only 213 for the 60 control days. According to Donald Redelmeier, a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto and the lead researcher, the findings suggest that stress, lack of sleep, alcohol use and less tolerance of other drivers contribute to the increase of deaths on tax day. Interestingly Professor Redelmeier noted that an increase of risk of this magnitude is about the same as Super Bowl Sunday, a time notorious for drinking and driving. Although there has long been speculation that stressful deadlines can contribute to driver error and fatal crashes, this is the first study to confirm that psychological stress contributes to real world accidents. Everyone agrees that people should observe obvious safety precautions such as buckling up seat belts, obeying the speed limit, avoiding alcohol, minimizing distractions and refraining from driving recklessly, but when people are under stress they frequently forget to do these common sense things. With tax day just behind us, we have another year to think about being more careful next April 15th.