Posted on 04/16/2009 2:05:18 PM PDT by zaphod3000
For the past 20 years, the U.S. has maintained a Minimum Legal Drinking Age of 21 (MLDA21), with little public debate about the wisdom of this policy. Recently, however, more than 100 college and university presidents signed the Amethyst Initiative, a public statement calling for "an informed and dispassionate public debate over the effects of the 21-year-old drinking age."
SNIP
Our research compares traffic fatality rates in states before and after they changed their MLDA from 18 to 21. In contrast to all earlier work, however, we examined separately the impact in states that adopted an MLDA21 on their own and those that were coerced by the FUDAA.
The results are striking. Virtually all the life-saving impact of the MLDA21 comes from the few early-adopting states, not from the larger number that resulted from federal pressure. Further, any life-saving effect in those states that first raised the drinking age was only temporary, occurring largely in the first year or two after switching to the MLDA21.
Our results thus challenge both the value of the MLDA21 and the value of coercive federalism. While we find limited evidence that the MLDA21 saves lives when states adopted it of their own volition, we find no evidence it saves lives when the federal government compels this policy.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Change the minimum age of military service to 21. There, all fixed! (/kidding)
The U.S. is the only country in the world with a 21 year old minimum drinking age.
Western Europe 16
Mexico 18
Canada 18 or 19 depending onthe province
Again,I just wish people didn’t drink so damn much, Legal and illegal. Why encourage it?
Wish in one hand right?
In my life experience, I have seen nothing but problems because of drinking.
I’ve got no use for it. But of course I have to deal with all the problems because people do. Problems that are unncessary if people werent getting effed up on that stuff.
I hate what it does to people.
Military personnel may consume alcohol at any age, but cannot purchase for off-premises consumption unless 21 or over.
For everyone else the drinking age is 21.
No other country has a 21 year drinking age. Most are 15-18 and quite a few don’t even have a drinking age.
So why not raise the driving age instead.
For that matter, New York State makes State Identification cards that look just like Drivers License and are just as official.
Why shouldn't someone with such an ID, who is obviously NOT a driver, be allowed to drink at 18 as they can't cause any auto accidents except by walking out in front of a car?
I don’t think there should even be a “legal” drinking age but I’m ok with 18 if we have to have one.
I almost guarantee that if you went up to anyone 19, and asked if they had drank, they would say yes. Even at a conservative college like mine, almost everyone would say yes. We even had rum cake at a retreat for a women’s prayer group. I hate drinking (I’m not 21 yet), is stuck doing it sometimes, (especially when you mistake some one saying cherry instead of sherry, and your 12 year-old brother wants to eat all the soup, after already having a alcoholic drink his aunt gave to him). And when I went to Italy, and roomed with girls all over the US (Chicago, Califonia) I was called Hannah Montana for the fact that I didn’t drink (and actually paid for the stuff I was using).
/sigh
I wonder if that’s because of the legal drinking age.
When I was a kid, drinking beer, wine, etc. was no big deal. We had homemade wine with every meal. It was during the time I was a teen, late 70s/early 80s that it became this “issue.”
It was easy for a teen to get booze 40 years ago, & I suspect it is even easier now.
This is much like the gun ban. To paraphrase: When booze is outlawed, only the drunks will have booze.
I do not condone teenage drinking, but the Gubmint wont stop it, no matter how many laws it passes. This is just more nanny state crap.
Hillary & Co. thinks “it takes a village” to raise a child, but it was the villagers who were selling us the booze, wine, & beer - at a substantial markup.
In 40 years nothing has changed but the laws, & they have changed nothing.
Fine, let 18's drink to their hearts content in Iraq.
This is another thing that just drives me CRAZY!
I was in the only age group in Texas that could legally drink at age 18. The next year, the legal age moved to 19. When I turned 21, guess, where the legal age went?
I would say.. the best age was: 19. This age, reduced the drinking in High School, but made it legal for most college students.
Studies from archival data of that sort are essentially free: some professor got a publication by doing the study at the behest of his or her university president, and as a result got a slightly higher raise than he or she would have gotten without the study, and that, and some paper and computer time was the entire cost of the study.
I think the military has changed the age to 21 which I disagree with- I had no problem with them being able to drink at 18. I know it is now 21 at Ft Bliss and believe it is Army wide or all services wide.
You exaggerate
It's also 21 in Armenia and Palau
Interesting comment about the driving age. This 2004 article from the Washington Post points out the European minimum ages for drinking are relatively low, but it is harder for teenagers to get a drivers' license.
[A] fundamental difference between U.S. and European approaches to drunk driving among young people: Americans have raised the drinking age to 21; Europeans keep it low but put faith in stiff rules and regulations.
While most European countries issue driver's licenses at age 18, the difficulty of passing the test, high insurance costs and wide use of trains and buses all mean that young people generally begin to drive much later than in the United States.
"They start drinking at 16, but they cannot drive until they are 18," said Florence Berteletti Kemp, a communications officer in Brussels for Eurocare, a private group that campaigns to reduce Europeans' alcohol consumption. "I think in the U.S., there is an expectation to have your own car. It's not that young people in Europe are more careful. It's that they haven't got the car."
. . . .most countries allow people to buy beer and wine at 16. In many places, such as France, drinking starts much earlier, with parents giving their children small amounts of wine at holiday celebrations. Switzerland allows drinking at age 14, and Poland and Portugal have no minimum drinking age.
Why not let parents decide - both when their children can drive and whether or not they can drink?
Isn’t the question one of maturity and who better to judge than parents. No apologies to any statists.
Shouldn’t we represent the people who really believe in liberty, ie trusting you with your own life?
It would make a nice contrast to the party of control and manipulation.
We hand them wonderful, bright-eyed five year olds and they return us sexed up, shallow, eighteen year old nihilists.
I don’t know about the forbidden fruit angle.
It seems to me one of a double standard. Many children see adults behave in absurd ways - drinking, sexuality, cursing - and, yet despite their good behavior they are treated like children. Adult no longer means mature, but over 21. Why not call a spade a spade?
Maturity is a behavior not an age.
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