That's the rage that feels completely out of control and can get completely out of control. There's a powder keg just waiting to happen. No government agency or official keeps statistics on all incidents of rage. But they account for hundreds of deaths every year, including 645 people slain on the job in 1999, the most recent year for which statistics are available. During the early 1990s, the average annual number of violent incidents reported between drivers in the United States increased 51 percent, to more than 2,000 in 1996, according to the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.
Experts suspect that thousands more incidents go unreported.
Though statistics indicate that violent incidents in schools and on the job are declining, experts say anger and incivility have increased in the past decade. We often are hurried. We have unrealistic expectations. We have, for example, a lot of travelers who think no flights they're on should be delayed or canceled. We should never be sick.