Greater percentage of wrecked cars being scrapped rather than repaired

This from the WSJ, via the carconnection.com site:
Car accidents are becoming more costly and as a result, The Wall Street
Journal reports, more vehicles are being scrapped instead of repaired. The
paper says this year thus far, 16 percent of vehicles involved in collisions
are being scrapped, up from just 7 percent in 1995. Part of the problem is
the increasing technology baked into vehicles like Jaguar's X and Audi's A8
aluminum-bodied cars with expensive and specialized repair needs. Airbags,
too, are causing more catastrophic damage to the interiors of cars,
resulting in high repair bills. Even headlamps - multiple beam xenon lamps
in particular - are far more expensive to repair than plain old halogens.<<

I've got to believe that this jump in total losses is having a big effect on
car insurance rates. Again, I ask why don't the car companies come out with
vastly simpler models? Wouldn't it be more profitable for everyone
concerned if you could still actually get something like a Hemi-equipped LX
car devoid of the electronic doodads for around, say, $20-25K? Cheaper to
buy, cheaper to insure, cheaper to repair. Probably longer-lived, too. Or
does everyone really *want* to have the processing power of a 1970s
datacenter embedded in their dashboard, and I'm the odd one out?

Serious question.
--Geoff

 

Computers which enable anti lock brakes and stability control reduce
accidents and insurance costs. Also the biggest part of insurance is still
liability and airbags saves lives which reduce liability costs so the heck
with the interior of the car.

 

What damage, besides killing smaller occupants, are airbags causing?
They do cost an arm and a leg to replace. I wonder if that is the
catastrophic damage they are referring to.

They build what people buy.

I think your average new car has much more computing power than a datacenter
from the 70's.

 

Air bags don't save lives. Seat belts do. Air bags may lessen injuries,
but they don't save lives. Some air bags also kill.

 

Except that insurance companies have been scrapping ABS discounts for
years now, since they *don't* reduce insurance claims.

Except that airbags *take* and *damage* lives, too.

 

Yep! Art Begun's ignorant parrotting notwithstanding, you are correct.

Ever sat in on a focus group?

There're at least three of us (I'll let Mister Three nominate himself if
he so chooses).

 

ABS doesn't reduce insurance claims because people don't know how to use ABS
properly.
The multi stage airbags should reduce airbag related injuries. In tests,
side curtain cars do far better protecting passengers than identical cars
without side curtains. Yes, Dan there are exceptions when the curtain is
poorly designed and does not protect the head adequately. I think it was a
Saturn.

 

Just call me miss Four

Lisa

 

Well I guess you guys don't believe the insurance industry crash test
results.

 

Independent insurance industry crash test results don't have any
significance to you Dan?

 

I'll respectfully dissagree here.

Yes, airbags can reduce the severity of injuries in that low
percentage of accidents where serious injury DOES occur. However, the
high cost of damage to vehicle interiors is incurred EVERY time the
air bag fires. The air bag fires, the majority of times, in incidents
(I won't call them accidents) that would be survived either injury
free or with minor injury if the occupants are wearing properly
adjusted seat belts.
EVERY air bag deployment costs large dollars, while only a small
mumber of incidents would involve serious injury without.
Also, air bags can CAUSE serious injury in cases where non air-bag
equipped vehicles would be safe.

Vehicle repair costs are a very real part of the reason for increasing
insurance costs.

Lawyers and outright fraud are a larger part of the increase in
insurance premiums than real medical costs.

The fraud artistes are well known to the authorities, but due to the
lawyers, attempting to convict them immediately gets characterized as
"racial profiling" so both the cops and the insurance companies let
them continue pulling their scams.

 

Complete instrument panel disintegration, windsheild damage, just for
starters.
Hit a curb at 10MPH with a late model Cavalier, and the interior
damage excedes the suspension damage by a factor of something like 3:1

No. people buy what companies sell. Smoke, mirrors, and all.

Yes, much more than some early 80's main frames.

 

In NC insurance rates have been remarkably stable.

By the way my father just got rid of a 87 Camry with only liability
insurance and replaced it with a Saturn L300 Wagon which costs about $25k.
New Saturn has full comprehensive and $250 deductible on collision. His
insurance cost only went up $200 per year. I had to ask twice.

 

You are ignoring the fact that today people are routinely walking away from
35 mph crashes without a scratch. In the old days it would mean major
hospitalization and insurance costs. A opthamologist friend noticed the
trend in the late 80's when calls for emergency eye surgery from car
accidents started to fall.

 

Which (time wise) also happens to coincide with states writing
compulsory seat belt laws.

 

I'm all for airbags and other safety features. But wouldn't it be
possible to implement those kinds of features without quite as much in
the way of electronics and computers?

I've recently read articles about celphones and car accidents, and some
studies are showing that other distractions, including the new
"telematics", are also major contributors to distraction and accidents.

Then again, I'm one of those few people who will answer the phone in the
car with "I'm sorry, I'm in the car, I'll call you back as soon as I'm
not driving"

Lisa

 

-Windshield
-Dashboard assembly
-Sometimes side glass
-Often steering wheel

All frequently destroyed or damaged beyond re-use in a bag deployment. And
that's without counting the airbags themselves.

And people buy what they build. C'mon, now, did anyone *demand* $100 car
keys?

 

Thank you. We agree.

Should, but don't.

 

Art, I "guess" you're right. I believe data accumulated from real-world
traffic crashes.

 

Which you seem to want to credit solely to airbags.

I know it's very hard for you, but *try* sticking to topics you know at
least a little bit about. That way you won't look like such a goof.