Google Cars Show That Driving Legally Increases Accident Rates

From The Wall Street Journal, "When Robo-Cars crash, It’s Your Fault: Google’s self-driving car never causes an accident but still has more than most." by Holman W. Jenkins, Jr:

[F]rom a Google spokesperson: "We just got rear-ended again yesterday while stopped at a stoplight in Mountain View. That’s two incidents just in the last week where a driver rear-ended us while we were completely stopped at a light! So that brings the tally to 13 minor fender-benders in more than 1.8 million miles of autonomous and manual driving—and still, not once was the self-driving car the cause of the accident."***At 13 accidents per 1.8 million miles driven, Google’s accident rate is about twice the accident rate of the safest cohort of drivers, ages 40-64. At 7.2 per million miles, Google’s rate most closely matches the accident rate of drivers 70-74—perhaps shedding light on a widely read blog post by a driver in Google’s neighborhood who reported "Google cars drive like your grandma."***If Google’s claims are accurate, then we face a paradox: Google cars have more accidents than other drivers, and it’s the other driver’s fault.***On your daily high-speed commute, you and other practiced commuters zoom along efficiently at 20 mph above the speed limit—until a Google car appears in your lane rigidly adhering to the law. In New York City, a Google car would be a metaphysical impossibility. A Google car would never be able to make a left turn, never be able to pull away from the curb and into traffic, because aggressive taxi drivers would quickly learn to exploit its algorithms.