The impact of self-driving cars is anticipated to be wide-ranging in many areas of daily life. Self-driving cars (also known as autonomous vehicles or AVs) have been the subject of significant research on their environmental, practical, and lifestyle consequences and their impacts remain debated.
Some experts claim substantial reduction in traffic collisions and the resulting severe injuries or deaths. United States government estimates suggest 94% of traffic collisions have humans as the final critical element in crash, with one study estimating that converting 90% of cars on US roads to AVs would save 25,000 lives per year. Other experts claim that the number of human error collisions is overestimated and that self-driving cars may actually increase collisions.
Self-driving cars are speculated to worsen air pollution, noise pollution, and sedentary lifestyles, to increase productivity and housing affordability, reclaim land used for parking, cause greater energy use, traffic congestion and sprawl. The impact of self-driving cars on absolute levels of individual car use is not yet clear; other forms of self-driving vehicles, such as self-driving buses, may actually decrease car use and congestion.
AVs are anticipated to affect the healthcare, insurance, travel, and logistics fields. Auto insurance costs are expected to decrease, and the burden of cars on the healthcare system to reduced. Self-driving cars are predicted to cause significant job losses in the transportation industry.
Automobile industry
A McKinsey report has forecast that AVs could reach $300 to $400 billion in revenue by 2035. The industry has attracted multiple car manufacturers, most notably General Motor's subsidiary Cruise and Tesla. Ford and Volkswagen invested billions in Argo AI but withdraw from the market by 2022, instead focusing on semi-autonomous driving (L2+, L3 under SAE classification). Notably, non-car manufacturers have also investigated and speculated about self-driving cars, including Google subsidiary Waymo, among others.
To help reduce the possibility of safety issues, some companies have begun to open-source parts of their driverless systems. Udacity for instance is developing an open-source software stack, and some companies are having similar approaches.
Public health
Car crash reduction
Proponents Estimates of numbers of crashes prevented by AVs varies widely. An NHSTA report in 2018 found that 94% of crashes had humans as the final causal step in a chain of events. One study claimed that if 90% of cars in the US became self-driving, an estimated 25,000 lives would be saved annually. Lives saved by averting automobile crashes in the US has been valued at more than $200 billion annually. Other studies claim self-driving car would have the potential to save 10 million lives worldwide, per decade. Opponents argue that the number of human driven crashes is taken out of context and estimates of lives saved may not be accurate.
Driving safety experts predict that once driverless technology has been fully developed, traffic collisions (and resulting deaths and injuries and costs) caused by human error, such as delayed reaction time, tailgating, rubbernecking, and other forms of distracted or aggressive driving would be substantially reduced. Some experts advocate the idea of a "smart city" and claim data sharing infrastructure with AVs could further reduce crashes.
Opponents Lack of data remains a key challenge in comparisons of fatalities per million miles between AVs and humans. One limited early study claimed a rate of 9.1 crashes per million miles by AVs, nearly double the rate from human driving, though crashes were less serious than humans. Arstechnica calculated 102 crashes over 6 million miles, but claimed crashes were low-impact and still safer than human driving. Waymo claimed only 3 crashes with injuries over 7.1 million miles, nearly twice as safe as human drivers. As more cities give permission for AVs to operate, incidents and complaints have increased.
Opponents of AVs have argued that current self-driving technology fails to take into account "edge cases" which may make the technology more dangerous than human driving. In 2017, driving experts were contacted by "TheDrive.com", operated byTime magazine, to rank autopilot systems. None ranked any of the autopilot systems at the time as safer than human driving. Factors that reduce safety may include unexpected interactions between humans and vehicle systems; complications due to technical limitations of technologies; the effect of the bugs that inevitably occur in complex interdependent software systems; sensor or data shortcomings; and compromise by malicious actors. Security problems include what an autonomous car might do if summoned to pick up the owner but another person attempts entry, what happens if someone tries to break into the car, and what happens if someone attacks the occupants, for example by exchanging gunfire.How Autonomous Cars Work (radio interview)
One ethicist argued that autonomous vehicles requiring any human supervision would create complacency and would be immoral to deploy. Specifically, they argued humans are unlikely to effectively take over during a sudden software failure if an impending decision is required immediately. Research shows that drivers in automated cars react later when they have to intervene in a critical situation, compared to if they were driving manually.
Other public health impacts According to a 2020 Annual Review of Public Health review of the literature, self-driving cars "could increase some health risks (such as air pollution, noise, and sedentarism); however, if properly regulated, AVs will likely reduce morbidity and mortality from motor vehicle crashes and may help reshape cities to promote healthy urban environments."
An unexpected disadvantage of the widespread acceptance of autonomous vehicles would be a reduction in the supply of organs for donation. In the US, for example, 13% of the organ donation supply comes from car crash victims.
Welfare
According to a 2020 study, self-driving cars will increase productivity, and housing affordability, as well as reclaim land used for parking. However, self-driving cars will cause greater energy use, traffic congestion and sprawl. Automated cars could reduce labor costs; relieve travelers from driving and navigation chores, thereby replacing behind-the-wheel commuting hours with more time for leisure or work; and also would lift constraints on occupant ability to drive, distracted and texting while driving, intoxicated, prone to seizures, or otherwise impaired.
For the young, the elderly, people with disabilities, and low-income citizens, automated cars could provide enhanced mobility. The removal of the steering wheel—along with the remaining driver interface and the requirement for any occupant to assume a forward-facing position—would give the interior of the cabin greater ergonomic flexibility. Large vehicles, such as motorhomes, would attain appreciably enhanced ease of use.
The elderly and persons with disabilities (such as persons who are hearing-impaired, vision-impaired, mobility-impaired, or cognitively-impaired) are potential beneficiaries of adoption of autonomous vehicles; however, the extent to which such populations gain greater mobility from the adoption of AV technology depends on the specific designs and regulations adopted.Ashley Jalsey III, Driverless cars promise far greater mobility for the elderly and people with disabilities, Washington Post (23 November 2017).Henry Claypool, Amitai Bin-Nun & Jeffrey Gerlach, Self-Driving Cars: The Impact on People with Disabilities (January 2017), Ruderman Family Foundation/Securing America's Future Energy.
Children and teens, who are not able to drive a vehicle themselves in case of student transport, would also benefit of the introduction of autonomous cars. Daycares and schools are able to come up with automated pick-up and drop-off systems by car in addition to walking, cycling and busing, causing a decrease of reliance on parents and childcare workers.
The extent to which human actions are necessary for driving will vanish. Since current vehicles require human actions to some extent, the driving school industry will not be disrupted until the majority of autonomous transportation is switched to the emerged dominant design. It is plausible that in the distant future driving a vehicle will be considered as a luxury, which implies that the structure of the industry is based on new entrants and a new market. Self-driving cars would also exasperate existing mobility inequalities driven by the interests of car companies and technology companies while taking investment away from more equitable and sustainable mobility initiatives such as public transportation.
Urban planning
According to a Wonkblog reporter, if fully automated cars become commercially available, they have the potential to be a disruptive innovation with major implications for society. The likelihood of widespread adoption is still unclear, but if they are used on a wide scale, policymakers face a number of unresolved questions about their effects.
One fundamental question is about their effect on travel behavior. Some people believe that they will increase car ownership and car use because it will become easier to use them and they will ultimately be more useful. This may, in turn, encourage urban sprawl and ultimately total private vehicle use. Others argue that it will be easier to share cars and that this will thus discourage outright ownership and decrease total usage, and make cars more efficient forms of transportation in relation to the present situation.
Policy-makers will have to take a new look at how infrastructure is to be built and how money will be allotted to build for automated vehicles. The need for traffic signals could potentially be reduced with the adoption of smart highways.O'Toole, Randal, Policy Implications of Autonomous Vehicles (18 September 2014). Cato Institute Policy Analysis No. 758. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2549392 Due to smart highways and with the assistance of smart technological advances implemented by policy change, the dependence on oil imports may be reduced because of less time being spent on the road by individual cars which could have an effect on policy regarding energy. On the other hand, automated vehicles could increase the overall number of cars on the road which could lead to a greater dependence on oil imports if smart systems are not enough to curtail the impact of more vehicles. However, due to the uncertainty of the future of automated vehicles, policymakers may want to plan effectively by implementing infrastructure improvements that can be beneficial to both human drivers and automated vehicles. Caution needs to be taken in acknowledgment to public transportation and that the use may be greatly reduced if automated vehicles are catered to through policy reform of infrastructure with this resulting in job loss and increased unemployment.Litman, Todd. "Autonomous vehicle implementation predictions." Victoria Transport Policy Institute 28 (2014).