Posted on 07/18/2005 10:19:10 AM PDT by Last Dakotan
Two decades ago, few in the booze business believed it would happen here, in the beer capital of the world. Sobering Facts College students spend $5.5 billion a year on alcohol, more than they spend on textbooks, soft drinks, tea, milk, juice and coffee combined. Source: Harvard School of Public Health study 12th-graders who reported consuming alcohol in the last 30 days dropped to 48% in 2004 from 66% in 1985. Source: University of Michigan study
While other, more sober states caved in to the federal government's order to raise their drinking ages to 21 or lose a portion of highway funds, Wisconsin - insulated by the thick biceps of the Tavern League - would not be easily blackmailed.
It was 1985. Debate swirled. Would the economic loss from cutting 19- and 20-year-olds out of the legal drinking equation outweigh highway withholdings? Would bumping up the age cut teen traffic deaths and eliminate the "blood borders" - the so-called stretches of highway where teens from other states with higher drinking ages sometimes crashed and died driving home after a night of drinking in Wisconsin?
Twenty years after Wisconsin acquiesced, like every other state, the drinking age is still hotly debated.
Supporters say the law has saved thousands of lives and created a healthier, safer environment on college campuses and throughout society.
Opponents say it has forced teens to drink in secret, leading to reckless binge drinking and unsupervised, sometimes dangerous house parties. They say it's a civil rights violation and an insult to military members trained to kill but not trusted to consume alcohol.
Their complaints are getting attention.
Legislators in Vermont are considering a bill to lower the legal drinking age to 18. Wisconsin lawmakers are considering dropping the age to 19 for military members. Already some U.S. cruise lines have dropped the age to 18 for drinking beer and wine on excursions outside U.S. waters.
Each side comes to the debate with statistics to back up its argument.
Alcohol-related traffic deaths of drivers under 21 dropped by 17% immediately after states increased their minimum drinking age, says Alexander Wagenaar, a professor of epidemiology with the University of Florida who has studied alcohol issues for three decades.
"Raising the age to 21 is probably the single most effective prevention effort that we've done for teen drinking in the last 30 years," said Wagenaar, who estimates that as many as 20,000 lives have been saved in car crashes alone as a direct result of raising the drinking age.
But studies also show that more people ages 21 to 24 were killed after the bump in the drinking age, suggesting that the law simply delayed the deaths, according to John McCardell, president of Middlebury College in Vermont, who believes college campuses need to be more progressive in exposing students to responsible drinking.
"It would be hard to say with a straight face . . . that the law has had the effect of reducing drinking on campuses in an appreciable way," McCardell said. "I would argue it's had the opposite effect." Teenage crashes dropped
Statistics from the Wisconsin Department of Transportation Bureau of Transportation Safety back Wagenaar's findings, said Dennis Hughes, the DOT's chief of safety policy analysis.
The alcohol-related crash rate for 19-year-olds dropped from 22 per 1,000 licensed drivers in 1985 to 5 in 2003, the latest year for which data is available, according to DOT figures. And when Wisconsin raised its minimum drinking age from 18 to 19 in 1984, the alcohol-related crash rate for 18-year-olds fell from 21 per 1,000 licensed drivers to 12. By 2003, that rate had dipped to 5 alcohol-related crashes per 1,000 licensed drivers.
"The numbers for highway safety are irrefutable, and we've reaped those benefits for a long time," Hughes said. "A lot more kids are surviving their teens."
Kari Kinnard, too, sees benefits to the higher minimum drinking age. As president of MADD Wisconsin, Kinnard pays close attention to the issue. Kinnard says recent studies on the human brain show that it doesn't fully develop until age 21.
"Supporting evidence just keeps coming in that the right decision was made to move the drinking age," Kinnard said.
The higher drinking age has meant fewer injuries and deaths at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said Susan Crowley, director of PACE (Policy, Alternatives, Community and Education), a 10-year, $1.2 million program aimed at curtailing underage drinking. The study is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
"Without a doubt, we've seen (the 21 minimum drinking age) improve the health and safety on campus," Crowley said.
More students are abstaining from drinking and are willing to admit they don't drink. Fewer students are being taken to detox, and fewer students report negative consequences as a result of their own or others' alcohol consumption, Crowley said, pointing to statistics gathered in the last five years.
Others, such as Richard Keeling, an expert on the effects of the 21 minimum legal drinking age, caution against crediting the drinking age for such progress.
PACE strategies such as cracking down on house parties and increasing fines for alcohol-related offenses are likely more responsible for changing behavior than a higher drinking age, Keeling said.
As a medical doctor, the former director of health services at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and past editor of the Journal of American College Health, Keeling said the 21 minimum drinking age has had a "great many negative consequences." Teenagers are going to drink no matter what the legal age is, Keeling said.
"The pattern for underage students is more dangerous," said Keeling, who now runs a consulting firm in New York. "Afraid of being caught, they drink a lot in a short period of time. They do it less often but more intensely." Case for supervised drinking
Much of the problem stems from lack of supervised drinking experience, said McCardell, the Middlebury president. That's where colleges could help. They could and should play an active role in teaching young people to drink responsibly, McCardell said.
"You have to give them some exposure," McCardell said. "That doesn't mean sending everybody out to get drunk. But if you're serious about teaching somebody biology, you're going to include a laboratory. College campuses could be little laboratories of progressiveness."
Brendan O'Connell, a senior at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, says some type of supervised exposure to alcohol at a younger age would be hugely helpful to young adults. O'Connell tells stories of friends who drink themselves sick on their 21st birthdays. Bars offer free shots, and birthday revelers don't know when to stop, he said.
"It's almost like a holiday. It's something you've been waiting for," he said. "I've been to 21st birthday parties where I've had to drag my friends home. It's pretty bad."
U.S. Rep. Tom Petri (R-Wis.) is one politician willing to consider alternatives to the 1984 act that coupled states' drinking ages with federal highway dollars. Petri has been working to persuade his colleagues that change is worth considering.
"If we're concerned about alcohol-related fatalities - and we should be - we should focus on alcohol-related fatalities," he said. "We need to leave greater flexibility to states to figure out the most effective way, rather than tell them we know all the answers."
"The fact that an 18-year-old can't have table wine at a family gathering is outrageous."
In many states, Texas included, a parent or legal guardian can legally supply alcohol to their own minor child, including at restaurants. (I believe this also works for spouses.)
OK, let some states decide the drinking age should be 18, let others make it 21 - or even higher - but make it the STATE's choice.
The Fed Gov has no d@mn business being involved in this question.
OK, let some states decide the drinking age should be 18, let others make it 21 - or even higher - but make it the STATE's choice.
The Fed Gov has no d@mn business being involved in this question.
I really think that the increase in drug use among the under 21 crowd has a lot to do with raising the drinking age.
I spent the first two years of high school in Virginia (drinking age 17) and then moved to Kentucky for the last two (drinking age 21). Alcohol was harder to procure in Kentucky and there were a lot more kids doing drugs ... easier to get & easier to conceal. I never did drugs and worked to keep my friends from doing drugs as well.
My solution: Lower the drinking age to 17 but only allow Low Alcohol beer/wine to be consumed by those under 21. Make the under-21 drink a case of beer to feel even a slight buzz, but let them feel that they are stepping into the adult world. Keep 'em off drugs, keep 'em safe, keep 'em out of jail, and collect taxes on the alcohol sales.
As a college student.... Legal age does not matter. Its not hard to find someone to buy for you. Beer pong (or Beirut) is practically a NCAA recognized sport on campuses now.When I was running a CR chapter in the mid 80s, the university sanctioned "Greek Week" included the Beer Marathon (quickest team to empty a pony keg w/o you-know-whatting) and the Beer Relay (an obstacle course where you had to chug a beer at various stops).
-Eric
"Fortunately, we no longer have Dimocratic senators. "Voinovich is usually okay, and as much as I dislike DeWiner, he's better than "the apalling Howard Metzenbaum" (to quote P. J. O'Rourke).In Ohio, one has to question whether that's really a victory!
-Eric
I have never figured out why people who are old enough to serve in the military are not considered old enough to drink alcoholic beverages. Doesn't make any sense to me.
I have never figured out why people who are old enough to serve in the military are not considered old enough to drink alcoholic beverages. Doesn't make any sense to me.Apparently, it takes more maturity to be trusted guarding nuclear weapons with an automatic rifle than it does to be trusted with a beer.
-Eric
Ahhhh Greek Week... Really don't remember too much.. Just kidding I'm not much for binge drinking. There is a C/R chapter in another Michigan school who is hosting a Cocktail party this year... It is however for 18+ but only 21+ can drink, they bring in cops/bouncers to enforce this.... I am interested to see how it goes.
21 does not matter if you live near Canada as I and most people my age in Michigan do. It is only 19 and as long as your not driving you can come back into the states.
You have no idea how much I agree with that statement. When I was a supervisor of young 18-20 year old troops I felt the drinking age thing was stupid. At least let them have a few beers on base where they can walk to their dorm room. Instead they got permission to move off base then got drunk in an apartment or worse at a friends apartment then tried to drive home.
Military should be allowed to drink on their base at the very least. Then we can ask em to go stand in front of people shooting at them.
It depends on the surrounding area. CONUS, 21 is the drinking age. In overseas assignments, 18 year olds can generally drink because the laws outside the gates allow it.
"My solution: Lower the drinking age to 17 but only allow Low Alcohol beer/wine to be consumed by those under 21. Make the under-21 drink a case of beer to feel even a slight buzz, but let them feel that they are stepping into the adult world. Keep 'em off drugs, keep 'em safe, keep 'em out of jail, and collect taxes on the alcohol sales."
How about: 17 if in HS and have a cumulatie and semester 3.3 or above GPA, with parental permission. 18 if you are a H.S. graduate. 19 for GED 21 for everone else.
Better yet, how about 18 as long as you're enrolled in a college or university? Encourage more kids to go into higher education, where for the most part you don't drive to the parties on campus, but walk.
Sort of. Here is the reg; the kicker is the last paragraph:
"In the case of a DoD installation located in more than one State or in one State but within 50 miles of another State or Mexico or Canada, the minimum drinking age on that DoD installation shall be the lowest applicable age of the State in which the DoD installation is located or the State or jurisdiction of Mexico or Canada that is within 50 miles of such DoD installation.
[I am sure this helped base alignments in Texas, I kid not.]
The minimum drinking age on a DoD installation located outside the United States shall be 18 years of age. Higher minimum drinking age will be based on international treaties and agreements and on the local situation as determined by the local installation commander.
The commander of a DoD installation may waive the above requirements, if such commander determines that the exemption is justified by special circumstances. Special circumstances are those infrequent, non-routine military occasions when an entire unit, as a group, marks at a military installation a uniquely military occasion such as the conclusion of arduous military duty or the anniversary of the establishment of a military service or organization. The event must be held on a military installation. The commander shall ensure that appropriate controls are in place to prevent endangering Military Service members or the surrounding community."
[While my experience is dated to GWI, and the exceptions have been tightened, the "special circumstance" were generally things like "Saturday."]
I don't like it either.
I hate to be so clishe, but I agree that if you can die for your country, it makes no sense that you can't drink.
I used to have that opinion. I have changed it to, if you are in the service, or have been in the service and honorably discharged, you can legally drink.
Having a 21yr old drinking age encourages reckless drinking at house parties. At a bar, you will at least be cut off by the bartender or thrown out by the bouncers. Either way, it teaches to be a little more responsible when drinking.
Another problem is the second we turn 21, we forget the cause because it no longer affects us.
We're continuing to allow our kids to be arrested and getting criminal records for doing what young adults are supposed to do: have a good time.
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