Minimum Driving Age

4 Pages 951 Words

As most may already know, Alabama is considering altering the requirement for attaining a driver’s license. The alteration would mean that all teenagers would have to wait to get their license until they are eighteen, opposed to sixteen.
“According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, 16 year olds are more than 20 times as likely to have a crash as other drivers. For every million miles driven, 16 year olds have 43 crashes. While other a driver over 19 have only 5 crashes. (Lynn, 48-51.) For example, in Europe the driving age is 18, New Jersey makes teenagers wait until 17; six other states allow 14 and 15 year olds to get licenses and 43 other states permit16 year olds to drive alone. (Lynn, 48-51.)
“These new laws, called “graduated licensing laws” are catching on all over the world. Six months after its graduated licensing laws went into effect; New Zealand’s driving fatalities for 15-17 year olds dropped by nearly one third. This is how the new graduated licensing laws work: Beginning drivers have to “graduate” through stages of “restricted driving” before they are allowed to get their unrestricted adult licenses (Lynn, 49).
In Kentucky a prospective driver must be at least 16 years old to get a permit and any licensed driver may provide supervision. Also, a learner’s permit must remain in effect only a month before full licensure. (Ellers, 1B.) In Hartford Connecticut under one bill, teenagers could not obtain learners’ permits or driver licenses until they turn 17 years old. Even after obtaining a license at 17, teenagers could only drive from 6a.m. to 11p.m. until they turn 18. It seems as though most teenagers have the same feelings as Tim Marciniak expresses in this statement, ”I just think they keep raising the age because society sees us as corrupt. I think the media portrays us as being negative. It’s always something negative toward teenagers. They never show the good we do, society-wise....