placestats

Population growth vs. Road traffic deaths

Holds up after adjusting for income

Across 183 countries, Population growth and Road traffic deaths rise and fall together at r = +0.47 (on a scale from −1 to +1, where 0 means no link). Comparing only countries with similar income (GDP per person) shrinks it to +0.25 (q = 0.038, allowing for the many pairs tested). Much of the first figure is that both measures rise with national income, but a weak positive link remains. Caution: direction is not consistent across regions.

Comparing countries across the middle half of population growth, 0.334% to 2.01% per year, road traffic deaths is worse by 6.82 per 100,000 population at the top of that range than the bottom. Comparing only countries with similar national income, the gap is 3.08 per 100,000 population.

Link before adjusting (r)+0.468p = 2.4e-11 · 183 countries
After adjusting for national income+0.247p = 0.001 · likely range [+0.10, +0.38]
p, allowing for regions0.003standard error 0.052 · 7 regions
Check for luck (q)0.038across 12,497 pairs

How to read these.r runs from −1 (one goes up as the other goes down) to +1 (they rise together), and 0 means no link. Adjusting for national income means comparing countries with the same GDP per person, so differences in wealth can’t explain the link. Income is used in percentage terms, since an extra $1,000 means more to a poor country than to a rich one. p is how likely a link this strong would be if there were really none. Below 0.05 means it is unlikely to be chance. Very small values are written in short form: 1.1e-32 means a decimal point followed by 31 zeros and then 11, so very close to zero. The likely range is where the true figure probably lies, and a range that crosses zero means the link could easily be chance. Countries in the same region tend to resemble each other, so the third figure allows for that, which gives a fairer p. The standard error is the typical size of the error in r. Finally, testing this many pairs means some will look strong by luck alone. A q below 0.05 means this link is unlikely to be one of those.

Population growth · % per yearlink with income -0.50 · moderate
Road traffic deaths · per 100,000 populationlink with income -0.71 · high

“Link with income” is how closely each measure tracks GDP per person across countries, from −1 to +1.

Every country as a dot

Population growth · % per year →Road traffic deaths · per 100,000 population →-3.43%4.68%064.6Afghanistan: 2.77% per year, 15.9 per 100,000 populationAngola: 3% per year, 26.1 per 100,000 populationAlbania: -1.17% per year, 11.7 per 100,000 populationAndorra: 1.17% per year, 7.6 per 100,000 populationUnited Arab Emirates: 4.68% per year, 8.9 per 100,000 populationArgentina: 0.339% per year, 14.1 per 100,000 populationArmenia: 1.74% per year, 20 per 100,000 populationAntigua and Barbuda: 0.465% per year, 0 per 100,000 populationAustralia: 1.53% per year, 4.9 per 100,000 populationAustria: 0.328% per year, 4.9 per 100,000 populationAzerbaijan: 0.432% per year, 6.7 per 100,000 populationBurundi: 2.41% per year, 35.5 per 100,000 populationBelgium: 0.699% per year, 5.8 per 100,000 populationBenin: 2.4% per year, 26.8 per 100,000 populationBurkina Faso: 2.21% per year, 31 per 100,000 populationBangladesh: 1.22% per year, 15.3 per 100,000 populationBulgaria: -0.126% per year, 9.2 per 100,000 populationBahrain: 0.734% per year, 5.2 per 100,000 populationBahamas, The: 0.435% per year, 7.7 per 100,000 populationBosnia and Herzegovina: -0.766% per year, 13.5 per 100,000 populationBelarus: -0.512% per year, 7.6 per 100,000 populationBelize: 1.39% per year, 22.6 per 100,000 populationBolivia: 1.35% per year, 21.1 per 100,000 populationBrazil: 0.383% per year, 16 per 100,000 populationBarbados: 0.0552% per year, 8.2 per 100,000 populationBrunei Darussalam: 0.777% per year, 7.5 per 100,000 populationBhutan: 0.65% per year, 16.2 per 100,000 populationBotswana: 1.61% per year, 26.4 per 100,000 populationCentral African Republic: 3.37% per year, 37.7 per 100,000 populationCanada: 0.939% per year, 5.3 per 100,000 populationSwitzerland: 0.96% per year, 2.2 per 100,000 populationChile: 0.48% per year, 14.9 per 100,000 populationChina: -0.17% per year, 17.4 per 100,000 populationCote d'Ivoire: 2.4% per year, 24.1 per 100,000 populationCameroon: 2.56% per year, 30.2 per 100,000 populationCongo, Dem. Rep.: 3.2% per year, 34.9 per 100,000 populationCongo, Rep.: 2.36% per year, 29.7 per 100,000 populationColombia: 1.01% per year, 15.4 per 100,000 populationComoros: 1.85% per year, 26.6 per 100,000 populationCabo Verde: 0.466% per year, 26.8 per 100,000 populationCosta Rica: 0.448% per year, 14.8 per 100,000 populationCyprus: 0.914% per year, 5.8 per 100,000 populationCzechia: -0.167% per year, 5.9 per 100,000 populationGermany: -0.0304% per year, 3.8 per 100,000 populationDjibouti: 1.31% per year, 23.5 per 100,000 populationDominica: -0.506% per year, 10.9 per 100,000 populationDenmark: 0.537% per year, 3.7 per 100,000 populationDominican Republic: 0.81% per year, 64.6 per 100,000 populationAlgeria: 1.32% per year, 20.9 per 100,000 populationEcuador: 0.848% per year, 20.1 per 100,000 populationEgypt, Arab Rep.: 1.56% per year, 10.1 per 100,000 populationSpain: 1.03% per year, 3.9 per 100,000 populationEstonia: -0.428% per year, 4.5 per 100,000 populationEthiopia: 2.55% per year, 28.2 per 100,000 populationFinland: 0.471% per year, 3.9 per 100,000 populationFiji: 0.469% per year, 13.5 per 100,000 populationFrance: 0.246% per year, 5.1 per 100,000 populationMicronesia, Fed. Sts.: 0.461% per year, 0.2 per 100,000 populationGabon: 2.11% per year, 23.9 per 100,000 populationUnited Kingdom: 0.297% per year, 3.2 per 100,000 populationGeorgia: 3.18% per year, 12.4 per 100,000 populationGhana: 1.83% per year, 25.7 per 100,000 populationGuinea: 2.31% per year, 29.7 per 100,000 populationGambia, The: 2.23% per year, 29.6 per 100,000 populationGuinea-Bissau: 2.16% per year, 32.2 per 100,000 populationEquatorial Guinea: 2.4% per year, 27.2 per 100,000 populationGreece: 0.0848% per year, 8.3 per 100,000 populationGrenada: 0.0819% per year, 8 per 100,000 populationGuatemala: 1.52% per year, 22.9 per 100,000 populationGuyana: 0.588% per year, 22.3 per 100,000 populationHonduras: 1.65% per year, 16.1 per 100,000 populationCroatia: 0.258% per year, 7.9 per 100,000 populationHaiti: 1.13% per year, 18.8 per 100,000 populationHungary: -0.501% per year, 7.7 per 100,000 populationIndonesia: 0.785% per year, 11.3 per 100,000 populationIndia: 0.887% per year, 15.6 per 100,000 populationIreland: 1.63% per year, 3.1 per 100,000 populationIran, Islamic Rep.: 0.924% per year, 21.5 per 100,000 populationIraq: 2.1% per year, 27.3 per 100,000 populationIceland: 1.51% per year, 2 per 100,000 populationIsrael: 1.2% per year, 3.9 per 100,000 populationItaly: -0.0629% per year, 5.3 per 100,000 populationJamaica: -0.0739% per year, 15.1 per 100,000 populationJordan: -0.279% per year, 17 per 100,000 populationJapan: -0.492% per year, 3.6 per 100,000 populationKazakhstan: 1.21% per year, 12.7 per 100,000 populationKenya: 1.93% per year, 28.3 per 100,000 populationKyrgyz Republic: 1.66% per year, 12.7 per 100,000 populationCambodia: 1.18% per year, 19.6 per 100,000 populationKiribati: 1.45% per year, 1.9 per 100,000 populationKorea, Rep.: -0.129% per year, 8.6 per 100,000 populationKuwait: -0.655% per year, 15.4 per 100,000 populationLao PDR: 1.32% per year, 17.9 per 100,000 populationLebanon: 0.746% per year, 16.4 per 100,000 populationLiberia: 2.09% per year, 38.9 per 100,000 populationLibya: 1.04% per year, 21.3 per 100,000 populationSt. Lucia: 0.225% per year, 29.8 per 100,000 populationSri Lanka: -0.733% per year, 19.7 per 100,000 populationLesotho: 1.1% per year, 31.9 per 100,000 populationLithuania: 0.0172% per year, 8.1 per 100,000 populationLuxembourg: 1.46% per year, 4.1 per 100,000 populationLatvia: -0.988% per year, 8.1 per 100,000 populationMorocco: 0.914% per year, 17 per 100,000 populationMoldova: -1.75% per year, 7.3 per 100,000 populationMadagascar: 2.4% per year, 29.2 per 100,000 populationMaldives: 0.355% per year, 1.6 per 100,000 populationMexico: 0.826% per year, 12.8 per 100,000 populationMarshall Islands: -3.43% per year, 5.7 per 100,000 populationNorth Macedonia: -0.189% per year, 5.1 per 100,000 populationMali: 2.9% per year, 22.7 per 100,000 populationMalta: 1.89% per year, 4.1 per 100,000 populationMyanmar: 0.641% per year, 20.4 per 100,000 populationMontenegro: -0.0635% per year, 7.6 per 100,000 populationMongolia: 1.25% per year, 21 per 100,000 populationMozambique: 2.85% per year, 30 per 100,000 populationMauritania: 2.78% per year, 25.6 per 100,000 populationMauritius: -0.164% per year, 12.2 per 100,000 populationMalawi: 2.56% per year, 33.4 per 100,000 populationMalaysia: 1.17% per year, 22.5 per 100,000 populationNamibia: 2.05% per year, 34.8 per 100,000 populationNiger: 3.22% per year, 25.5 per 100,000 populationNigeria: 2.06% per year, 20.7 per 100,000 populationNicaragua: 1.31% per year, 16.9 per 100,000 populationNetherlands: 0.522% per year, 4 per 100,000 populationNorway: 0.69% per year, 2.1 per 100,000 populationNepal: -0.111% per year, 16.3 per 100,000 populationNew Zealand: 0.654% per year, 9.6 per 100,000 populationOman: 3.96% per year, 10.6 per 100,000 populationPakistan: 1.56% per year, 13 per 100,000 populationPanama: 1.22% per year, 13.9 per 100,000 populationPeru: 1.04% per year, 13.6 per 100,000 populationPhilippines: 0.811% per year, 12 per 100,000 populationPalau: -0.181% per year, 4.78 per 100,000 populationPapua New Guinea: 1.75% per year, 12.6 per 100,000 populationPoland: -0.338% per year, 9.4 per 100,000 populationPortugal: 1.03% per year, 8.2 per 100,000 populationParaguay: 1.2% per year, 22 per 100,000 populationWest Bank and Gaza: 2.33% per year, 5.3 per 100,000 populationQatar: 3.92% per year, 7.3 per 100,000 populationRomania: -0.166% per year, 10.3 per 100,000 populationRussian Federation: -0.109% per year, 12 per 100,000 populationRwanda: 2.17% per year, 29.4 per 100,000 populationSaudi Arabia: 4.63% per year, 35.9 per 100,000 populationSudan: 2.38% per year, 26.8 per 100,000 populationSenegal: 2.3% per year, 23.5 per 100,000 populationSingapore: 1.22% per year, 2.1 per 100,000 populationSolomon Islands: 2.35% per year, 16.5 per 100,000 populationSierra Leone: 2.04% per year, 33 per 100,000 populationEl Salvador: 0.43% per year, 20.9 per 100,000 populationSan Marino: 0.388% per year, 0 per 100,000 populationSomalia, Fed. Rep.: 3.34% per year, 27.4 per 100,000 populationSerbia: -0.568% per year, 7.5 per 100,000 populationSao Tome and Principe: 1.98% per year, 27.9 per 100,000 populationSuriname: 0.851% per year, 15.3 per 100,000 populationSlovak Republic: -0.152% per year, 6.1 per 100,000 populationSlovenia: 0.168% per year, 5.1 per 100,000 populationSweden: 0.254% per year, 3.1 per 100,000 populationEswatini: 1.07% per year, 33.5 per 100,000 populationSeychelles: 1.13% per year, 11.3 per 100,000 populationSyrian Arab Republic: 3.77% per year, 14.9 per 100,000 populationChad: 3.41% per year, 32.4 per 100,000 populationTogo: 2.18% per year, 28.7 per 100,000 populationThailand: -0.0672% per year, 32.2 per 100,000 populationTajikistan: 1.83% per year, 15.7 per 100,000 populationTurkmenistan: 1.65% per year, 13.5 per 100,000 populationTimor-Leste: 1.27% per year, 11.9 per 100,000 populationTonga: -0.417% per year, 33 per 100,000 populationTrinidad and Tobago: -0.0416% per year, 9.3 per 100,000 populationTunisia: 0.58% per year, 16.5 per 100,000 populationTurkiye: 0.42% per year, 6.7 per 100,000 populationTanzania: 2.86% per year, 31.1 per 100,000 populationUganda: 2.7% per year, 29.4 per 100,000 populationUkraine: 2.92% per year, 10.2 per 100,000 populationUruguay: -0.0561% per year, 14.8 per 100,000 populationUnited States: 0.522% per year, 12.7 per 100,000 populationUzbekistan: 1.88% per year, 11.7 per 100,000 populationSt. Vincent and the Grenadines: -0.69% per year, 7.4 per 100,000 populationViet Nam: 0.603% per year, 30.6 per 100,000 populationVanuatu: 2.23% per year, 14.9 per 100,000 populationSamoa: 0.589% per year, 13 per 100,000 populationSouth Africa: 1.15% per year, 22.2 per 100,000 populationZambia: 2.77% per year, 20.5 per 100,000 populationZimbabwe: 1.88% per year, 41.2 per 100,000 populationARECAFDOMJPNMDAMHLOMNQATSAUTON

best-fit line line after adjusting

Four ways to measure the link

MethodrpCountries
Standard (Pearson), not adjusted+0.4682.4e-11183
By rank (Spearman), not adjusted+0.5121.3e-13183
Standard (Pearson), adjusted for national income+0.2470.001183
By rank (Spearman), adjusted for national income+0.2310.002183

The rank version uses only each country’s place in line, from lowest to highest, so a few extreme countries count for less. The adjusted and unadjusted versions use the same 183 countries: those that report both measures and GDP per person. So the gap between them comes from the adjustment, not from a change in which countries are counted. Drop in the size of r after adjusting: +0.221 (a minus sign means it grew).

How solid is it?

Leaving out one country at a time, r ranges from +0.185 (without SAU) to +0.283 (without DOM). The bar above shows that range on a scale from −1 to +1, with the solid line at the full result. The single country that moves r most: SAU (-0.062).

Fragile: this link may not hold up.
  • direction is not consistent across regions

Within each region

Countries are not separate, unrelated cases, and neighbors share a lot. A link that holds inside each region is far more believable than one that shows up only when comparing regions.

nr
East Asia & Pacific27+0.03
Europe & Central Asia50+0.18
Latin America & Caribbean30+0.30
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan22+0.06
Sub-Saharan Africa46-0.06

By income third

If the link shows up only in the richest third of countries, it is a feature of rich countries, not a general pattern.

nr
Poorest third61+0.30
Middle third61+0.25
Richest third61+0.40

By largest religious group

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
Christians108+0.23
Muslims49+0.28

By last european coloniser

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
France25+0.15
Never a European colony21+0.32
Spain20+0.30
United Kingdom60+0.13

Without outliers (countries far outside the middle half of countries on either measure, by more than one and a half times the width of that middle half): r = +0.172 after dropping 4 countries.

Two series, one country

Both measures over the years for one country you pick. The two charts are stacked so they share only the years along the bottom.

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Over time, within countries

Everything above compares countries with each other at one moment. This section compares each country only with itself over 20years. So a link here can’t come from anything about a country that stays the same, such as its history, geography, institutions or culture.

Within countries over time, there is no link that is clearly more than chance (r = +0.001, comparing each country only with itself over the years, and each year only with the same year elsewhere). Whatever the cross-country picture shows, countries whose population growth moved did not tend to see their road traffic deaths move with it.

Across countries (adjusted)+0.247for comparison
Within countries+0.029each country vs itself
…and vs the same year elsewhere+0.001q = 0.992 · 183 countries
Year-on-year changes+0.026q = 0.562

3,660 country-years (one country in one year), 183 countries, 2000–2019, about 20 years each on average. Share of the variation that happens within countries over time: 33% for Population growth, 13% for Road traffic deaths. The margins of error allow for each country appearing many times, and for each year’s value being close to the year before.

Year-to-year changes are a cautious test, not a final answer. Looking only at changes from one year to the next removes each country’s own trends. But it also makes measurement mistakes louder, which pulls the results toward zero. A near-zero result here is weak evidence of no link, not proof.

With one measure years behind the other

0.10−0.1-100+10years Road traffic deaths trails Population growth →lag -10: r = -0.009 (n = 2,927)lag -9: r = -0.008 (n = 3,110)lag -8: r = 0.010 (n = 3,293)lag -7: r = 0.029 (n = 3,476)lag -6: r = 0.037 (n = 3,659)lag -5: r = 0.046 (n = 3,659)lag -4: r = 0.066 (n = 3,659)lag -3: r = 0.077 (n = 3,659)lag -2: r = 0.064 (n = 3,660)lag -1: r = 0.037 (n = 3,660)lag +0: r = 0.001 (n = 3,660)lag +1: r = -0.035 (n = 3,660)lag +2: r = -0.069 (n = 3,660)lag +3: r = -0.079 (n = 3,660)lag +4: r = -0.075 (n = 3,660)lag +5: r = -0.071 (n = 3,660)lag +6: r = -0.060 (n = 3,660)lag +7: r = -0.063 (n = 3,660)lag +8: r = -0.063 (n = 3,660)lag +9: r = -0.083 (n = 3,659)lag +10: r = -0.097 (n = 3,659)

Same year (lag 0): +0.001. A peak away from zero does not show which comes first. These series change slowly — this year’s value is close to last year’s. That makes the curve smooth and nearly symmetric, whatever produced the data. Even a sharp peak at one lag (a gap of some years) would not prove that one measure changes the other.

This curve peaks at the edge of the window (lag +10), so it is still drifting where the search stops. That pattern usually reflects a slow trend left over in the data, not a link with real timing. The peak value should not be read as the “true” link at the right lag.

The data


% per year
per 100,000 population		Years
United Arab Emirates ARE4.68%8.92025, 2019
Saudi Arabia SAU4.63%35.92025, 2019
Oman OMN3.96%10.62025, 2019
Qatar QAT3.92%7.32025, 2019
Syrian Arab Republic SYR3.77%14.92025, 2019
Chad TCD3.41%32.42025, 2019
Central African Republic CAF3.37%37.72025, 2019
Somalia, Fed. Rep. SOM3.34%27.42025, 2019
Niger NER3.22%25.52025, 2019
Congo, Dem. Rep. COD3.2%34.92025, 2019
Georgia GEO3.18%12.42025, 2019
Angola AGO3%26.12025, 2019
Ukraine UKR2.92%10.22025, 2019
Mali MLI2.9%22.72025, 2019
Tanzania TZA2.86%31.12025, 2019

World Bank, World Development Indicators
World Bank, World Development Indicators

Sources

Population growth

Population growth (annual %)

World Bank · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

Road traffic deaths

Mortality from road traffic injury (per 100,000 population)

World Health Organization · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

The World Bank's copy stops at 2019.

How this was computed

Data used: most recent value in 2010-2025; values come from 2013–2025. To adjust for income, each measure is first predicted from GDP per person (in percentage terms, on a log scale) with a straight-line fit. Only what is left over is then compared. This is called a partial correlation. The line is drawn the standard way (ordinary least squares), which picks the line that comes closest to all the countries at once. The error margins allow for countries in the same region resembling each other, using 7 World Bank regions. The q-value corrects for testing all 12,497 pairs at once, using the Benjamini–Hochberg method. Underlying data last updated DYB 2024. How the country data works · explore Population growth and Road traffic deaths

This page shows that two measures go together. It does not show that Population growth changes Road traffic deaths, or the reverse. These figures also describe countries, not individual people. See the ecological fallacy.

More links with Population growth or Road traffic deaths