Poll: In the States you can have a drivers license at 16. That is much too young.

[evilstonermonkey]

The very best driver I know is my 16yo step brother. The least responsible one I know is a friend's boyfriend who is a streetracing yuppie in his 30s, and I truly expect to hear about him having an accident on the news someday. Age and maturity do not go hand in hand, nor does ability with either. Getting your licence should be reliant on skill and responsibility, both of which should need to be proved before receiving a license, irrespective of age.

 

[rabidmidget]

Age doesn't matter, there will always be idiots driving.

Once on a road trip with friends, the driver decided to try updating his facebok on the highway, luckily I convinced him to let me do it for him.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

I'm fine with the age as long as you pass the test, said test should just be a lot harder to weed out idiots who don't belong on the road.

The thing that really boggles my mind is how learning how to drive is handled in the States. The fact that it's expected of you to learn from one of your peers. Practice outside of a specially rigged instruction car without a specially trained instructor?! Are you mad?! I would've wrecked myself and others at least 5 times already if my driving instructor hadn't intervened.

Learning driving before learning how to cope with alcohol? That seems very odd to me. Drinking age is 16 here, driving age 18. Now I am not saying those ages are the 'right' ages, just think that the order of learning seems more logical to me.

This is fairly easy to explain, would you rather people are able to drink at the same time they are allowed to drive, or sober younger drivers?

Sober teens...yeeeeaaaaah... Mind you, I'm not agreeing with the other guy.

Yeah, but they're going to be more drunk if they can legally buy alcohol. So...

 

[Kenami]

I am 20 years old, American, and still don't have my driver's lisence.

Same here.

 

[dementis]

It's definately too young, hell I think 18 is too young for the legal age to drive because I know bugger all responsible 18 year and seeing as most road accidents are caused by teenagers I think that driving should work like motorcycles licenses, gotta take about 3 seperate tests and it takes about 5 years to get to high powered vehicles.

 

[Spaec]

16 is waaaaaay too young. I would *not* feel safe around an unsupervised sixteen-year-old behind the wheel. Does anyone else get the impression that the 16 years limit seem to be based mostly on America's obsession with individual independence?
We Swedes need to be 18 years old to take our license but may drive supervised from 16 up.

 

[Duruznik]

In Israel you can only get your license at 17, and in my opinion that's much better. A lot changes in that year between 16 and 17, with most people.

 

[taciturnCandid]

Some teens want to work. It is nice to give them the ability to travel to those jobs in rural areas.

 

[Hollock]

If the driving age was 21, then 21 year olds would suck at driving, and they would seem the least responsible. And if you could get your license at 13 then people would say that you're not a responsible driver until you're 16.

 

[XxSummonerxX]

Well hang on. In Australia we can get our L's (Learner's Permit) at 16, we're on that for 12 months and we need to fill in a logbook with all the skills, which has to be checked off by a qualified driving instructor, and we need to do 75 hours total supervised driving. That supervisor has to have had their full license for 2 years (I think).


Then we get our P's (Probationary I think). P platers can drive by themselves, but have to display plates at all times, and have less demerit points on their license than someone with a full license. There are some other laws but I'm not to sure of them. We're on those for 2 years.
After 18 (I think) months we can drive without plates, but all the other laws apply.

I also think it's worth noting, that Australia has a Blood Alcohol Limit of 0.05. Ps and Ls have a limit of 0. Even one tiny drop earns you license disqualification, points, fines, whatever.

After our 2 years on P's we qualify for our full license. Which is exactly the same as a P plate but you can get more demerits on your license, and the BAL is 0.05.

I like that system. So do the American 16 y/o's get their full license, or some kind of learners?

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

While it is generally true that young people are involved in a great many wrecks (which would be the only reasonable basis for denying them the privilege of driving), much of the reason is simply that they are inexperienced at the basic act of driving itself. New drivers, no matter what age, are bad drivers. Combine that with the fact that a great many teenagers are expected to work along with the relatively long distances between various places they need to be, a problem exacerbated by a poor public transit system in most cities and towns around the country and I find the argument that they ought not drive to be difficult to justify.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

I like that system. So do the American 16 y/o's get their full license, or some kind of learners?

I attended drivers education for six weeks when I was 15 where I was required to do a fair amount of driving and demonstrate the capacity to perform basic driving skills. I was also required to take a simple test covering basic traffic laws. I was then given a learners permit that allowed me to drive a car with an adult with a license for six months. Only then was I allowed to get a full license.

 

[9999squirrels]

It really depends on the person driving, adults can be as bad or worse as teen. As long as you can instill good habits in your kids when they drive there is no reason to raise the age limit.

 

[OliverTwist72]

It was a 16 or 17 year old girl and, I shit you not, she had her phone to one ear, a tube of mascara or something in the other and was looking in the rearview mirror as she was applying it. One knee was resting on the bottom of the steering wheel and the other leg looked like it was operating the pedals. I was so shocked and stunned that all I could do was stare at her until the car behind me beeped his horn because the light was green. Then off she was again, driving with her knee.

I see middle aged people doing this during rush hour...stupid people are stupid no matter how old they are. And actually in Illinois they raised the unsupervised driving age to 18, (well kinda it's a graduated program).

16 is fine, I didn't have an accident until I was 20ish (was the other guys fault).

 

[superspartan004]

I'm an American and my parents didnt let me get my license untill I turned 18, I wasn't all that mad about it since I wouldn't have had a car to drive anyway.

 

[Frozen Donkey Wheel2]

It's not too young. I could drive just fine at the age of 16, and I get just as much crap from other drivers in the form of the elderly and middle aged as I do from teenagers.

 

[Araxiel_1911]

Driving age: 16
Porn age: 18
Drinking age: 21

That's something that always bugged me about the US. It makes no frigging sense. Driving a car is something far more dangerous than drinking a glass of wine or a can of beer. At the age of 16 you start being responsible, but that can overwhelm you and you still think that if something goes wrong, mommy will kiss your booboo and daddy will shout a bit at you and the worst case scenario is being grounded for a few days. But in real, the car accident can kill the family in the other car and put you in a wheelchair. Thus age for a car license should, or rather must, be at the age of 18.
On the other hand, if you take something as simple and natural as drinking alcohol away for 21 years (or let's say 7 years since fourteen is the time you start to hang out with people and get the idea of drinking), then teenagers will just drink it illegaly and behind the back of society and once they turn 21 overdo it since they're then legal to do it.
I think the age restrictions here in Germany are great and well chosen for these things;
Driving age: 18
Erotic (e.g. Playboy, no sex): 16
Porn: 18
Public Drinking/Buying light alcohol (wine, beer etc.): 16
Public Drinking/Buying hard alcohol (spirits): 18

 

[OliverTwist72]

Driving age: 16
Porn age: 18
Drinking age: 21

That's something that always bugged me about the US. It makes no frigging sense. Driving a car is something far more dangerous than drinking a glass of wine or a can of beer.

Actually most people use the argument here in the states it should be 18 because if you can get drafted into the army at 18 you should damn well be able to drink a beer.

But in all seriousness, if you go to college you're probably drinking at 18 anyway (and even if you don't go to college).

 

[LITE992]

However learning to drive is not easy and is best attempted young. I think the law should be changed so 17/16 years old can drive but only as provisional drivers, so they have a fully qualified person in the passenger seat to make sure they don't stop concentrating. Perhaps allow a full drivers licence once they've clocked a certain number of hours behind the wheel. This would be almost impossible to enforce, but in an ideal world would be nice.

In Canada we have graduated licensing, with three classes. First there is the G1 license, which you get after passing the written test above a certain percentage. If you have a G1, you must have a class G driver (the highest license) in the front passenger seat with you, neither of you may drink, cannot drive between midnight and 5:00 AM, and cannot drive on freeways. After a year with the G1 you can take the G2 written test. With a G2 all the restrictions of a G1 apply but you get to drive unsupervised. A year after that you can get the full G after passing its written test, where no restrictions apply (but you can't drink).

I think America should have some form of graduated licensing. You can't just put a teenager behind the wheel and say "Drive this."

 

[Zantos]

People can be shit drivers and complete arseholes at any age. Last bloke who tried to kill me was about 60, time before that about 40. As long as they've gone through the required amount of lessons and passed the test then anything 16 or above is fine really, they can only be as bad as the others. Incidentally I'm in the UK, licence at 17, pink licence at 18.