One of the most frequent questions I get involving car travel is a variation of the how important are car seats / seat belts? question. It’s phrased in different ways, such as when parents ask if kids really benefit from continuing to rear-face past one (they do), or if preschoolers should still be rear-facing (they should), or if kindergartners are old enough for boosters (typically not), or if elementary-aged kids are fine in the front seats (almost never). These variations of the question are quite mild, though, compared to the more brazen versions, such as whether car seats are really necessary over short trips, or whether kids can share seat belts or go without them when traveling around the neighborhood. To put it simply, yes, car seats are always necessary for kids who aren’t old enough to use seat belts (i.e., most children under 10-12), and no, it’s never OK for kids to share seat belts or go without them once they’re old enough to no longer need seat belts. We’ll take a deeper look at these questions below.

Do kids really need car seats (or seat belts) on short trips around the street, in my neighborhood, or at low speeds in town?

Yes. Car seats (and seat belts for older children) are designed to keep children safe from auto-related blunt force trauma (hitting or being hit by objects with sufficient energy to cause injury or death). Such trauma can occur at even low speeds. It can occur during short trips in town or around the neighborhood; this isn’t a risk worth taking. Let’s look at how many parents take that risk and what can happen when they do.

NHTSA statistics indicate that the vast majority of child passengers are restrained, although precise numbers aren’t available to tease out under what conditions children are least likely to be restrained. However, we know that in 2015, 89% of kids under 13 who traveled in cars were restrained. This figure peaked at 97% for kids under 12 months, dropped to 94% for kids between 1 and 3, and dropped to 88% for kids between 4 and 7.

What percentage of kids are restrained according to best practices?

However, just because most kids are restrained doesn’t mean they’re properly restrained. Only 87% of children under 1 were rear-facing, despite that being the law in every state; another 10% were forward-facing (a much more dangerous choice), while 3% were completely unrestrained (most likely lap babies, which is as risky as it gets for a child in a car). Between ages 1 and 3, only 9% of kids were rear-facing, despite that being by far and away the safest choice for children in that age range. The majority at 68% were forward-facing, while 14% were in boosters (even less safe than forward-facing at that age), 4% were only restrained in seat belts (even less safe than boosters), while 6% weren’t restrained at all. By the time kids reach 4-7, a full 26% were using seat belts (despite seat belts being inappropriate for 100% of 4-7 year olds) and 12% had no restraint system whatsoever.

How much more are children likely to be seriously injured in crashes if they aren’t restrained in car seats or seat belts?

Now that we’ve gone over how children are restrained, here’s what happens when they aren’t. The 2010 NHTSA Report “Children Injured In Motor Vehicle Traffic Crashes” notes on page 10 that unrestrained children under 1 were roughly 8x as likely to sustain incapacitating injuries as restrained children under 1. Unrestrained children between 1 and 7 were 7x as likely to suffer incapacitating injuries as restrained children.

What exactly is an incapacitating injury?

Incapacitating injuries were defined as injuries rated as 2 or higher on the Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS), a rating scale for injury severity. The scale ranges from 1 to 6; a 1 is a minor injury (e.g., a skin contusion). An AIS-2 is a moderate injury, such as a fractured sternum or a minor liver contusion; an AIS-3 is a serious injury, such as an open fracture (where the bone breaks through the skin) of the humerus or a fractured femur. An AIS-4 is a severe injury, such as a perforated trachea or a flail chest. An AIS-5 is a critical injury, such as a ruptured liver with loss of tissue or a complex ruptured spleen. An AIS-6 is a maximum, fatal, or unsurvivable injury, such as a total severance of the aorta or brainstem. An AIS-1 represents a 0% probability of death. An AIS-2 is a 1-2% probability. An AIS-3 is an 8-10%, while an AIS-4 and 5 are 5-50% fatal events, and an AIS-6 represents a 100% fatality rate.

What risks do unrestrained children face in frontal, side, and rollover crashes? And does the seating position make a difference?

In other words, unrestrained children are 7x-8x more likely to suffer moderate to fatal injuries as children properly restrained. The discrepancy in injury rates applies in a range of situations. Page 12 in the study notes that unrestrained children in frontal crashes who sat in the 1st row were 7x as likely to experience AIC-2+ injuries; the risk was 6.5x as high for children in frontal crashes in 2nd and additional rows. In rollovers, the risk was nearly 3x as high for unrestrained children. In side impacts, the risk was 5-8x greater for unrestrained children. To put it simply, the risks are highly elevated in all kinds of crashes and in all seating configurations; there is no safe place to seek shelter in in a vehicle without restraints.

What kinds of injuries are kids most likely to face in a car crash?

Furthermore, children who sustained AIC-2+ injuries were most likely to sustain head injuries; specifically, these injury rates were highest in children under 1. The article noted the potential for long-term complications from head injuries in children and the greater likelihood of their sustaining poorer injury outcomes than what adults would experience from similar injuries. The article additionally noted the possibility for the delayed appearance of neurological deficits after head trauma, such as frontal lobe trauma impeding higher level reasoning, social interactions, and interpersonal skills in adolescents. Similarly, injuries to reading and writing areas in the brain could likely be hidden until children reached school age and began to show signs of delayed skills in these areas.

Unrestrained children are more likely to suffer brain damage. This brain damage may not become obvious for years, and it may also be irreversible. There is no compelling reason to voluntarily transport children in motor vehicles without appropriate restraints.

The rules of physics apply equally to younger children unrestrained in car seats and older kids and adults unrestrained with seat belts. They continue traveling at the same velocity as the car until they come to a stop (in the front vehicle seat, in the dashboard, in the windshield, through the windshield, into a tree, into the road, etc). In other words, it’s not okay for older kids to skip seat belts on really short trips or when driving at really low speeds, and it’s not okay for adults to do so either. Everyone is at risk.

Can kids or adults share seat belts on short trips, at low speeds, or in the neighborhood?

No. Seat belts are designed to be used by one person at a time. The forces experienced in a collision are tremendous; even a 15 mph crash is equivalent to falling off a 7.5 foot ladder. It’s easy to fracture an extremity (e.g., an outstretched arm, wrist, leg, elbow, knee) from such a height. A 25 mph crash is like being pushed off the roof of two story building (i.e., 20.5 feet in the air) – some studies have shown a 50% death rate from falls of that height.

Sharing seat belts doubles (or more) the force that a given seat belt is designed to manage while severely increasing the risk that each occupant sharing the belt will collide with the other  during the throes of the crash. If there aren’t enough appropriate restraints for each occupant, the vehicle must not be allowed to start. The risks (as illustrated above) are far too high.

But I’m a safe driver / drive really slowly / only do it once in a while / etc

No matter how safe we are, we can’t control what other drivers do. A full 50% of motor vehicle fatalities involve multiple vehicles; you can drive at 15 mph all day long but if someone else is drunk or texting and rams into you at an intersection at 45 mph, you just found yourself in a 45 mph side impact collision where nothing you do at that moment will affect your survival. All that will matter will be whether you and your loved ones were safely restrained or not (and whether or not you were driving a vehicle with basic safety features like side impact airbags with head and torso coverage). Don’t put any more of your loved ones’ lives in the hands of strangers than necessary. Never pull out of park until everyone in your vehicle is properly restrained every single time. Once you’re on the road, it’s too late.

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Parents frequently email me with questions related to best practices in car seat safety. Sometimes they have to do with which car seats allow kids to rear-face the longest or which convertible seats will work 3 across in most vehicles or which infant seats are the most 3-across friendly. However, they often have to do with whether kids of a certain age can safely sit in particular kinds of seats. I recently wrote a guide to the best car seats for preschoolers and the best car seats for kindergartners, which a number of readers found helpful. As a result, today, we’ll take a look at the safety, legality, and sensibility of allowing elementary-aged children to sit in the front seat. If you’re in a hurry, here’s what you need to know: it’s not safe for young children to sit in the front seat, but it’s legal in most states in the US. Is it ever OK? I’d argue yes in the most extreme circumstances, but not in 99% of cases we’re likely to encounter on a daily basis.

Why isn’t it safe to let elementary-aged children (kindergarteners, 1st graders, 2nd graders, 3rd graders, 4th graders, and 5th graders) sit in the front seat?

It isn’t safe to let elementary-aged kids seat in the front seat of vehicles because the front of a car, SUV, pickup truck, or minivan is the most dangerous part of a vehicle. A full 50% of auto fatalities involve multiple-vehicle collisions. Most fatal multiple-vehicle crashes involve frontal impacts. In frontal impacts, the odds of survival are lowest in the front row and highest in the rear-most row (the 2nd row in a 2-row vehicle, the 3rd row in a 3-row vehicle). Placing your child in the front passenger seat places him or her in one of the two most risky seats in a vehicle, statistically speaking (the other being the driver’s seat). On top of this, elementary-aged kids don’t have fully formed bone structures. Teenagers don’t either, but they’re a lot closer to being fully formed than younger children.

To put it another way, teenagers are much safer sitting in the front seat (although they’d still be safer in the back seats) than children because teenagers are larger, heavier, more developed, and perhaps most importantly, more likely to properly fit adult seat belts while being large enough to not be at serious risk of injury from frontal airbags. The seat belt fit issue is key; a child who doesn’t fit an adult seat belt isn’t going to be restrained properly by such a seat belt in a crash, and stands a much higher risk of either being hurt by the seat belt or slipping out of the seat belt and flying unrestrained into the dashboard (or through the windshield, through the door window, into the roof, etc). None of these are good scenarios, and they’re all far more likely if a child is seated in a seat belt before s/he’s capable of passing the five-step test for seat belt readiness.

It’s not worth rushing. Kids belong in the back seat. The NHTSA explicitly recommends keeping children in the back seat until at least 13. The younger children are, the more of a risk they face by sitting in the front compared to when sitting in the back. And as I’ve noted, that risk is always greater in the front–even for adults.

OK…so it’s not safe. But is it legal to let an elementary-aged child sit in the front passenger seat?

Even though it’s nowhere near best practices, a review of current laws indicates children may ride in frontal seats in virtually all states. California wisely notes that rear-facing children can’t ride in the front row if the passenger air bag can’t be disabled. Delaware takes things a step farther and applies that rule to all children either under 12 (hello best practices!) or under 65 inches in height. Louisiana goes almost as far by noting that children either under 6 or under 60 pounds must follow that rule (avoiding the front seat if the passenger air bag can’t be disabled) unless a rear seat is unavailable. And Wyoming extends the law to all children under 9 unless a rear row is unavailable, and notes that in such cases, children must still be secured in a child safety restraint while seated in the front seat.

However, that’s a grand total of 4 states out of 50. Puerto Rico has no front seat provisions, and nor do 46 other states. Canada isn’t any better; British Columbia requires kids stay away from frontal airbags until they’re at least 9kg and 1 year old, while no other province has any laws whatsoever related to front row avoidance. The other 12 territories and provinces are silent.

To put it mildly, if you want to do this, the law won’t stop you. But it’s not best practice.

Is it ever OK to have an elementary-aged child in the front seat?

Despite all the reasons not to place kids in the front seat, there are situations where it’s a necessary evil. If you’ve got a vehicle without seat belts in the back seats, then yes, it would be safer for a child to sit in the front row. However, it would be safest for the child not to ride in such a vehicle at all, particularly if such a vehicle featured a frontal airbag that couldn’t be disabled. In vehicles where the frontal airbags can be disabled, it’s still safer to seat a child in the back row, presuming seat belts are available there, but a child in an appropriate child restraint  sitting in a frontal vehicle seat without frontal airbags would be acceptably safe. In fact, this is actually a common setup in Sweden with rear-facing seats, and they enjoy the lowest child fatality rates in the world. However, Swedes also rear-face past 4 and follow a range of best practices in driving patterns, vehicle safety, and road design.

On top of disabling the frontal airbag and making sure the child were appropriately restrained (i.e., a rear-facing seat if possible, followed by a forward-facing harnessed seat or booster seat), you’d also want to push the vehicle seat as far backwards as possible to provide as much space as possible between the child and the dashboard. And of course, do remember that rear-facing seats are never to be used in vehicles where frontal airbags can’t be disabled; the airbags drive the rear-facing seats (and the children in them) into the vehicle seats at high speeds, killing the children inside them.

This is a lot of information. Is there a quick rule of thumb on front-row-vs-back-row safety I can follow?

Sure! A good rule of thumb is that if you can’t disable the frontal airbag, a child under 13 has no business being in the front row if a rear seat with a 3-point seat belt is available. And if you can’t disable that frontal airbag, a rear-facing child should never ride in the front row.

If you find my information on best practices in car and car seat safety helpful, you can do your shopping through this Amazon link. Canadians can shop here for Canadian purchases. Have a question or want to discuss best practices? Send me an email at carcrashdetective [at] gmail [dot] com.

There has never been a better time to buy a car seat in the United States than today in 2020. It’s not so much because the technology has gotten better, even though there have been slight improvements here and there; it’s because Americans are more aware than we’ve ever been about best practices in car seat safety. More parents than ever are rear-facing until 3, 4, or 5, even though the number is still far smaller than it would ideally be, and is in countries like Sweden and Norway. More parents than ever are keeping children harnessed (forward-facing) until their children are able to safely sit in booster seats, instead of rushing to booster far too soon (remember, preschoolers don’t belong in booster seats. Neither do most kindergartners, for that matter). Farther along, more parents than ever are keeping their children boostered until they pass the 5-step test, even if that means boostering until 10 or 11 (or later!). And finally, more parents than ever are keeping their children in the back seat until 13 instead of placing them in the front seats during the elementary school years. To put it simply, we’re getting the word out there, and parents are listening.

However, parents can’t follow best practices without the right car seats, and parents can’t use the right car seats if they can’t afford them.

Given the fact that the poverty rate in the US is somewhere around 13-14% each year and the 2017 federal poverty rates are $24,300 for a family of 4 (e.g., 2 adults and 2 children), $20,420 for a family of 3, or $28,750 for a family of 5, it’s no surprise that many parents aren’t following best practices simply because they don’t believe they can afford to. Fortunately, as parents become increasingly aware of best practices, car seat manufacturers and retailers respond by making seats that allow for best practices more affordable. Today we’ll look at my favorite seats for following best practices for car seat use from birth through infancy, the toddler and preschool years, the elementary years, and the middle school years. Each seat slots in under $200 while allowing parents to keep their children restrained as safely as possible for their unique stages of physical, cognitive, and emotional development.

The Best Car Seat for Infants and Babies Under $200 in 2020

When leaving the hospital with your baby, you’re going to need a car seat. Yes, you can technically leave without one, such as if you plan on walking or taking the bus, but it’s going to be most comfortable and practical (and the only legal option if you plan on using a car, minivan, SUV, or pickup truck) to use a car seat. You can use a convertible car seat, and there are a number of parents who start their kids directly in convertibles (e.g., the Graco Extend2Fit) to avoid the hassle of switching seats within the next year when the infant seat is outgrown. However, most parents find it simplest and most convenient to simply use an infant car seat; these can plug in directly into bases in vehicles and detach for use on the go, allowing you to transfer sleeping babies from the car to the store (or home, if you’re lucky). Of these seats, the Chicco KeyFit 30 (review here, buy here) is my favorite sub-$200 option. It’s simple, safe, well-designed, and easy to use.

The Best Rear-Facing Car Seat Under $200 in 2020

Although it’s more convenient to start with an infant seat, a number of parents will go straight to the convertible car seat (one that rear- and forward-faces) to avoid needing to switch seats in a year when their baby outgrows the infant seat. Whether you choose the convertible seat from the start or after the infant seat stage, it’s a seat you’re going to need if you plan on extended rear facing (which is what you want to do). When rear-facing, the number one rule is the longer the better. Rear-facing is safer than forward-facing at every stage of life (even adulthood), but it makes the biggest difference during the early years. Most Americans forward-face by 1.5; in Sweden and Norway, most parents don’t until 4 or later. That’s the goal here, and the cheapest seat to make it possible is the Graco Extend2Fit (review here, buy here). With a 50 pound weight limit and 49″ height limit, you’re virtually guaranteed to get nearly all children to at least 5, which means you can rear-face through the preschool years into kindergarten, keeping your children as safe as possible during the years where single biggest killer of children is car traffic.

The Best Forward-Facing, Combination, and Booster Car Seat Under $200 in 2020

Once done rear-facing, you’ll want to forward face until your child is capable of using a booster seat as safely as s/he’d use a forward-facing seat. For some kids, that’s as early as 4 or 5, but for many, it’s closer to 6 or 7. The Britax Pioneer  (review here, buy here) is the best seat under $200 that takes the work out of making either decision. It’s a combination seat, which means it can be used either harnessed as a forward-facing seat or sans harness and with seat belt as a high-back booster.

The research states that high-back boosters are as safe as harnessed seats once children are safe enough to use them, but since this seat will allow you to forward-face while harnessed until 70 pounds and 56″ in height, if you don’t want to worry about whether or not your child can maturely sit, even while sleeping, in position while using a seat belt, you can simply keep the seat in harnessed mode until your child is 7 or 8 and you’re completely sure. Once you switch to booster mode, you won’t be tempted to skip the five step test for seat belt readiness; with a 120 pound and 60″ height limit, the odds are strong that your child will still fit in the Pioneer when s/he’s 10-12 and ready to test out into a seat belt.

Are good car seats more affordable than ever? Yes!

In conclusion, I hope you’ll agree with me that things have never been better with regard to car seat safety than today in the United States. Whether in the diffusion of safety knowledge or in the availability and affordability of seats that actually comply with best practices, we’re slowly moving toward a safer society that recognizes and makes steps to ameliorate the very real dangers of auto traffic. As a quick note, remember that before summer 2014, there was only one seat in the United States that allowed rear-facing until 50 pounds, the Clek Foonf; now there are more than half a dozen, and the number only continues to grow.  Car seats are only part of the overall safety picture, of course; how we drive, what we drive, and how our national driving culture is structured together make up the lion’s share of the differences in driving death rates from one country to the next, but every step in the right direction brings us closer to the goal of a safer world.

If you find my information on best practices in car and car seat safety helpful, you can do your shopping through this Amazon link. Canadians can  shop here for Canadian purchases. Have a question or want to discuss best practices? Join us in the forums!