Minimum Legal Drinking Age Debate - Essay Example

Minimum Legal Drinking Age Debate All the 50 U.S. states have set age 21 as the Minimum Drinking Age (MLDA). However, a number of states have exceptions that permit consumption under 21 when done at home, under the supervision of adults or when necessitated by a medical reason. Those pushing for a lower MLDA argue that the current MLDA 21 has just exacerbated binge drinking instead of serving the intended purpose of stopping teenage drinking. Youths are now drinking from environment that are uncontrolled, unhealthy and life endangering. Those opposed to a lower MLDA base their argument on the notion that teenagers at 18 are not mature and responsible enough to handle alcohol. They are therefore at a higher risk of harming or even killing themselves and other people by engaging in drinking before age 21. In this paper I will be arguing that MLDA21 has been effective and therefore should be maintained. Minimum Legal Drinking Age is a controversial topic in the United States. The MLDA in the United States is set at the age of 21 whereas 90 percent of the countries around the world have set lower MLDAs. Interestingly young adults in the countries that have lower MLDA seem to consume alcohol in a more proper way while binge drinking and alcohol poisoning continue to present as a serious issues in America. This phenomenon has raised a growing public concern with groups like Choose Responsibility beginning to call for lowering of the MLDA to 18. On the counter argument is Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) who proposed the MLDA 21 in 1984 backed with the federal government’s support. The original purpose of setting MLDA at the age 21 was to curb the rise drunk driving presented which was a serious issue during the time. There are more hidden benefits of this law that have been realized along the way of its implementation. MLDA 21 has been effective in preventing not only drunk driving but also reducing the spread of drug use to lower age groups and thus lowering the MLDA may cause spillover effects through introduction of alcohol related issues to younger populations. In July 2008, more than one hundred university and college presidents signed the Amethyst Initiative, calling for public debates and reconsideration of the Minimum Legal Drinking Age. As voice of those who demand lowering the MLDA continued to get louder and louder, Jeffrey A. Miron, a senior lecturer of Harvard University, wrote an article on Forbes discussing the background factors. According to Miron, “When the U.S. repealed the prohibition of alcohol in 1933, states were free to legalize, regulate or prohibit access to it as they saw fit... In 1984.” Congress passed the Federal Underage Drinking Act (FUDAA), providing for withholding of transportation funding for states without MLDA21. This was based on the argument that a higher MLDA would lower traffic fatalities related to alcoholism and as at the end of 1988, following the enactment of FUDAA, MLDA21 was adopted by all states in US (Miron). After the Prohibition, MLDA in United States was granted to states’ jurisdiction. In the times before the Mothers Against Drunk Driving proposed the FUDAA, many states had 18 as the MLDA. FUDAA required all states to bring up their MLDA to the age 21 due to high fatality rates associated with drunk driving. Furthermore, Jeffrey Miron stands with those school presidents and appeals for a lower minimum drinking age. “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.” According to study most of the life-saving impact of the MLDA21 came from the few early-adopting states and not those that were coerced. Furthermore any life-saving effect in those states that first raised the drinking age was just temporary as it occurred mostly in the first or second year of MLDA21 (Miron). The arguments by Miron appear to be valid. However, according to his Forbes online article analysis he did not consider the fact that as population increased, although the number of road kills increased, the actual fatality of drunk driving decreased significantly. Also, the MLDA law proved to be effective according to the analysis during the first two years of enforcement. It is true that the MLDA 21 law has affected the United States society greatly and at many levels. Many scholars and analysts have studied and analyzed the impacts and indirect implications of this law. As more and more academic journals were published, people came to realize the MLDA 21 has many hidden advantages that outweigh its disadvantages. Senior statistical data analyst, Melissa J. Krauss studied the long-term effects between the MLDA 21 and marijuana and illicit drug use. Her study showed that, “Among the full sample, exposure to permissive MLDA laws (ability to purchase alcohol Read More