By Yosi Yahoudai
Founder and Managing Partner

When searching for “what are the odds of being involved in a car accident?“, A commonly spouted statistic online states that for every 1,000 miles you drive, you have a 1 in 366 chance of being in a car accident. This data is usually attributed to Esurance, however, the data actually originated from the US Census Bureau.

This data first started making the rounds in 2016, when the Esurance.com blog released this infographic (which has since been deleted):

If you look closely, the source for that statistic comes from data published on the census.gov website in 2012. The link has since been deleted, but you can still see the data from the internet archive’s wayback machine at https://web.archive.org/web/20140401221156/https://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s1103.pdf.

That data has also been shared below as an image.

Although the data is from before 2009, you now know the full history of where that statistic came from and why we say that you have a 1 in 366 chance of being involved in a car accident per 1,000 miles you drive.

About the Author

Yosi Yahoudai is a founder and the managing partner of J&Y. His practice is comprised primarily of cases involving automobile and motorcycle accidents, but he also represents people in premises liability lawsuits, including suits alleging dangerous conditions of public property, third-party criminal conduct, and intentional torts. He also has expertise in cases involving product defects, dog bites, elder abuse, and sexual assault. He earned his Bachelor of Arts from the University of California and is admitted to practice in all California State Courts, and the United States District Court for the Southern District of California. If you have any questions about this article, you can contact Yosi by clicking here.