The US has a driving age of 16 in most states and France,18, with an allowance for younger driving with certain conditions met. Most European countries have a limit of 18 and in the UK there is a campaign to lift the age to 21 (gleaned from a quick google search so don't take as gospel).
Personally I think our driving age is too young but am also reluctant to deny responsible 15 year-olds the opportunity.
2 comments:
there are two reasons we have been allowing young'uns to drive - a basic lack of public transport and a huge rural area. young people practically need to be able to get themselves to school, tech, uni and work.
The huge flaw in such an analysis is that the rate of car ownership and miles (or kilometers) driven is much higher in the countries with the higher death tolls. These things need to be corrected for before worrying about minimum driving age.
I have never bought that 15 is too young to drive. In fact it would be very interesting to identify the lifetime accident rates for those who started driving young against those who started later.
It may well be those who start young actually turn out better drivers in the long term, would this be surprising?
However without data who can say.
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