Bicyclist traffic fatalities

It appears that as the world has collectively decided to monetise charisma through influencer partnerships, bicyclists have taken this as a cue to die in greater numbers, as if the universe were running a peculiar experiment in whether capitalism and kinetic energy can be made to correlate through sheer force of statistical willpower. The two datasets move together with the confidence of a couple who have convinced themselves they have something in common. One involves people being struck by vehicles. The other involves people being struck by sponsored content.

What's likely happening here is the kind of thing that keeps statisticians awake at night: both metrics are essentially measuring the same underlying economic expansion, just through different windows. Between 2016 and 2022, the world got richer, more urbanised, and more digitally connected, which meant more people cycling in congested cities, more cars on roads, and simultaneously more smartphones in pockets generating the raw attention economy that fuels influencer marketing. The influencer industry ballooned from roughly eight billion dollars in 2016 to somewhere north of sixteen billion by 2022—essentially doubling—while urban bicycle use in major cities increased proportionally as congestion and environmental consciousness pushed people toward two-wheeled transport. Both are children of the same economic epoch, riding the same wave of growth, which is to say neither one caused the other so much as they were both carried along by the tide of how we live now.

This is the thing about correlations: they are everywhere once you start looking, which is either a profound truth about how interconnected the world is or a humble reminder that we are pattern-seeking creatures who will find meaning in the bathroom tiles if given half a chance. The human mind does not enjoy randomness, so it cheerfully pairs bicycle fatalities with influencer spending and declares it a universe that makes sense. Perhaps the universe does. Perhaps we're just very good at seeing what we want to see.