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Driving at 16?ˇ
I live in Europe.
I'm just wondering why in the states, you have to be 16 to drive...but 21 to drink?
Here, drinking age varies from 16-18 in most places, but as far as I'm concerned you have to be 18 to drive.
Why the big differences?
And also which one would you prefer?
Thanks :)
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A lot of kids get part-time jobs around the age of 16, so they need a way to get around. It probably helps start their independence, also.
Drinking is abused so much in the states. So so much. Maybe the two are linked? Kids don't know when you are too drunk to drive and so they drink and drive and kill people. They do it anyways of course, but yeah maybe it is because they don't know when enough is enough until later in life. So if they can't allow us to do both and since we need the driving one, they give that one to us and set the drinking for a little later when we know enough is enough.
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I'm pretty sure that the drinking age law was put in place since prohibition in the early 1900s. It has varied from 18-21 in many places. Most are 21 now, I believe it is mostly because of maturity and responsibility issues. Many people still aren't responsible at 21. When I was in Denmark in highschool, I saw that families were much more open about drinking and parents really instill responsiblity with drinking. In the US, that doesn't happen, im not sure why, but it doesn't. I hope that helps some.
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I guess the idea is that at 16 you're responsible enough to drive, but not to drink, which actually sounds fairly logical to me. The drinking age is set by all the states, and the reason it's 21 everywhere is because the federal government will cut the funding of a state's roads/highway/freeways if they make it lower than 21.
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well i'm 16 with a license and honestly, i don't get it either. we had a huge talk about this in class a few days ago. i heard from someone who lives in europe that kids don't abuse it as much as they do here in the states (correct me if im wrong). so i guess it was just set up that way. personally i would rather be able to drive than drink because i'm a busy person and i'm always out so its more convenient for me even though it sucks not being legally able to drink until 21, and its easy to underage drink anyway, especially if you're with small groups, you just have to have older connections to buy for you.
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