Helsinki records zero traffic deaths for full year

This is one of the things I find difficult about travelling abroad, particularly with children. I'm used to incredibly high safety standards, and when I'm in traffic in many other places in the world it feels like going back a few decades.

Genuine question: we have a lot of research on how not to die in traffic (lower speeds around pedestrians, bicyclists stopped ahead of cars in intersections, children in backward facing seats, seatbelts in all seats in all types of vehicles, roundabouts in high-speed intersections, etc.)

Why are more parts of the world not taking action on it? These are not very expensive things compared to the value many people assign to a life lost, even in expected value terms.

Voter demographics, car lobbyism and/or corruption.

Eg. in Germany we’re held hostage by pensioners, who have cars as part of their identity and their pensions swallowing major parts of the state’s tax income. The car industry would be really unhappy, if the "joy to ride" was diminished by any amount, so politicians sing their song. Traffic won’t be slowed, bike infrastructure won’t be built, shit‘s not gonna get fixed.

I presume politics isn’t as lucrative in Finland and everything is smaller, fewer cooks.

I agree on cars, but pensions don't come from taxes.

Where do German pensions come from?

From the pension system which is separate from taxation. De jure the current pensioners paid into the system for decades and now get paid back. De facto they get funded by contributions of the currently employed, but they don't swallow up any tax money or hold anyone hostage because if the current system was scrapped there would not be more tax money available for other things (e.g. public transport). The money is collected by a dedicated agency and does not flow through the government.

The current system is hated by people who've been farmongered into thinking there won't be any pensions when it's their turn (this tactic has been around for at least 50 years and hasn't happened yet). And also successfully FOMOed into thinking they are missing out on huge gainz if they would invest the money otherwise. Even though probably true, I quite like the current system of solidarity. And anyway when you go the private insurance route, the way it's setup currently, you are giving away a huge percentage of your earnings to the insurance. They justify this by saying your gainz are only taxed at 50% of their actual value, but since one of the biggest problems of the world today is an overgrown financial strength (thus influence) of large corporations, caveat emptor.