A young man, turning 18 tomorrow, ponders all of the benefits he is going to obtain in a day by gaining a year in age. What he does not realize however, is he will not have complete freedom because he is still considered too young. As 18 is the legal age of becoming an adult within the United States, he is allowed to work full time, purchase tobacco products as well as engage in sexual conduct with anyone else above the age of 18, yet he is still denied the right to enter bars or possess any alcoholic beverage in his system. Ever since 1984, the legal age in which one may consume an alcoholic beverage has been 21 despite the numerous bills and legislations that have been attempted to be enacted. The debate for a lower drinking age however, spans all the way back to the prohibition era in which alcohol was banned entirely. The current age for consuming an …show more content…
However, their strongest argument is that drunk driving fatalities would increase even though, “traffic accidents are most common among newly-legal drivers regardless of the MLDA (Minimum Legal Drinking Age)” (procon.org n/a). Whether or not a younger driver is drunk or not, they have a greater chance of causing an accident as they are new to the road and do not have as much experience as people who have been driving for longer. Lowering the legal drinking age to 18 would not cause more drunk driving accidents to occur as it is common for a young adult to get into an accident between the ages of 18-20 without being drunk. All in all, drunk driving really can not be used as an excuse to not lower the legal drinking age as the statistics of fatalities would have no direct correlation between the changing of the