Money to Burn? Data Suggest Rich Speed More

Aug. 9, 2004 -- -- Watch out for rich people in their fancy cars.

It turns out people with higher incomes say they push past the speed limit more often than middle-income drivers, according to data gathered by the Gallup polling organization for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

"In Los Angeles, anyone will tell you that most speeding is done by 17-year-olds in souped-up Hondas," said Steven Berglas, a California psychologist specializing in white-collar criminal behavior who was not surprised by the finding. "The next group is really older guys in the really slower models of Mercedes who are trying to overcome mid-life crises."

Dawn Royal of Gallup found the relationship between moderate speeding and higher incomes to be statistically significant, and was surprised to find such a correlation.

"I was actually intrigued by it," Royal said, "especially because it only seemed to hold true for the speeding elements and not the other aggressive driving measurements."

NHTSA/Gallup's 2002 National Study on Speeding and Aggressive Behavior initially concluded young people and males are most prone to aggressive driving, and that appears to remain true. However, Royal's fresh analysis of the data, requested by ABCNEWS.com, found high income may be a lesser determining factor for predicting moderate speeders.

According to the data, 60 percent of those surveyed with household incomes from $75,000 to $99,999 — and 66 percent with household incomes of $100,000 or more — said they "often" or "sometimes" drive 10 mph over the posted speed limit, compared with 42 percent to 49 percent of people at lower income levels.

Similarly, 77 percent of drivers with household incomes between $75,000 and $99,999, 73 percent earning more than $100,000, and 70 percent earning between $50,000 and $74,999 said within the past week they had exceeded the number of miles per hour over the speed limit that they thought might lead to a police stop.

ABC News' polling unit was unable to independently analyze the primary data in Gallup's survey, and critics say there could be other factors — such as age, driving frequency or employment patterns — behind the speeding-income correlation.

Still, as respondents' incomes rose, they were progressively more likely to say the posted speed limit on multi-lane highways was too low.

The speeding-income correlation seemed to break down when drivers were asked if they drove more than 20 mph over the speed limit, leading Royal to believe while higher-income people were prone to moderate speeding, they were no more prone to excessive speeding than other drivers.

Another recent survey by Firmani & Associates for the PEMCO Insurance company in Washington state also suggested there may be a correlation between household income above $75,000 and speeding, according to a PEMCO spokesman. However, the results were not verified by ABC News, and, as with the NHTSA/Gallup poll, the survey was not designed to test for a correlation between speeding and income.

"Everyone wanted to know: Why was it the people with higher income and with college degrees" who said they sped more often? said the PEMCO spokesman, Jon Osterberg. "Frankly, I don't know. Any answer would be speculative. We hope to ask it next time."

Several traffic experts said they were surprised by the suggestion that higher-income people may speed more, saying presumably better-educated individuals should know that speeding can be deadly, having been blamed for thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of injuries annually, according to the American Automobile Association.

"This might be a case in which people who have a lot of knowledge, or they think they have a lot of knowledge, maybe second-guessing the actual studies that show your speed, or the physics of speed, increases the likelihood of a crash," says Bella Dinh-Zarr, national director of traffic safety policy for AAA.

At least one person wasn't surprised by the numbers indicating high-income drivers ignore the posted speed limit more often.

"Scofflaw behavior is directly correlated with wealth," said Berglas, the California psychologist who treats many wealthy patients. "They genuinely believe … the laws governing the hoi polloi don't apply to them."