The Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) sets the legal age at which a person can purchase alcoholic beverages. The MLDA in the United States is 21 years. However, prior to the passage of the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984, the legal age at which alcohol could be purchased varied from state to state.1 For the most part, July 17 is a rather anticlimactic day. (Unless you claim this date as your birthday, in which case, woo! Confetti keywords and banners.) Without knowing it, however, something happened in 1984 that affects many of us: the National Minimum Drinking Age Act was passed, which set the legal drinking age at 21. However, determining the underlying cause of this decline in the total number of deaths is not an easy task. Deaths from non-alcoholic traffic crashes also decreased relative to the number of kilometres driven over the same period, due to a number of causes, including increased seat belt use, widespread use of airbags, and other improvements in car and road safety. In addition, drunk driving may decrease for the general population due to increased education on consequences, harsher penalties, better enforcement, or increased stigmatization of impaired driving. When the “forbidden fruit” is no longer prohibited, the young simply drinks more. In states where the drinking age was 18, young people drank more than in states where the minimum drinking age was 21. As adults, in their early twenties, they continued to drink more.4 References 4.
Maisto, S.A. and Rachal, J.V. (1980). Evidence of the link between adolescent drinking practices, related behaviours and the Drinking Age Act: A review of data from a national sample. In H. Wechsler (ed.), Minimum drinking age laws: An evaluation (pp. 155-176). Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath & Co. Read More Some states allow parents to do so with their own child (rarely, if ever, with someone else`s child), but there is no evidence that this approach actually works.3 In fact, there is evidence to the contrary. When teens feel they have their parents` consent to drink, they increasingly do so when they are not with their parents. When parents have concrete and enforced rules for alcohol, young people drink less.
References 3. Fallen, James. Excerpted from “Chapter 2: Federalism: Resolute, the Federal Government Should Restore the Freedom of Each State to Set Its Drinking Age.” in Ellis, Richard and Nelson, Michael (eds.) Debating Reform. CQPress Publishers, Fall 2009. The Partnership for Drug-Free Children contains a page of myths and truths about underage drinking, all supported by research. What really struck me was that after prohibition, total prohibition of alcohol, many states set a legal drinking age at 21. But that began to change after the voting age was lowered to 18. Many states have followed suit by lowering their drinking age, which has changed the landscape for the entire country. 1984-2014: National drinking age raised to 21: In response to the drunk driving epidemic of the 1970s, President Ronald Reagan passed the Minimum Drinking Age Act in July 1984, a law requiring states to raise the drinking age to 21. The National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 [23 U.S.C. § 158] requires states to prohibit persons under the age of 21 from publicly purchasing or possessing alcoholic beverages as a condition of receiving state highway funds.
A federal ordinance interpreting the law excludes possession “for established religious purposes” from the definition of “public property”; accompanied by a parent, spouse or legal guardian who is at least 21 years of age; for medical purposes, if prescribed or administered by a physician, pharmacist, dentist, nurse, hospital or authorized medical facility; in clubs or private institutions; or for the sale, handling, transportation, or supply of liquor by reason of the lawful employment of a person under twenty-one years of age by a duly licensed manufacturer, wholesaler, or retailer of liquor” [23 C.F.R. § 1208.3]. Myth: Some parents believe that providing alcohol to teens at home reduces the risk of drinking alcohol as adolescence ages and subsequent alcohol problems later in life. However, when the legal drinking age dropped nationwide in the `70s, alarm bells began ringing, notes licensed clinical psychologist Suzette Glasner-Edwards, PhD, associate professor at UCLA`s Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. “Research conducted after this period strongly suggested that an increase in road accidents among young people was associated with this change in the legal drinking age,” she tells Teen Vogue. “As a result, citizen efforts have begun to push states to reinstate 21 as the legal minimum age.” University presidents who have supported the Amethyst Initiative — a movement launched in 2008 to rethink the national drinking age of 21 — admit that drunk driving is a serious problem, but they stress that it`s not the only potential pitfall for young drinkers. They argue that by lowering the drinking age, colleges would be able to bring alcohol outside and educate students about responsible drinking. Such education could help reduce alcohol poisoning, drunk injuries, alcohol-related violence and alcoholism on campus. Students hate the age of alcohol consumption, not that they keep it.
About four out of five students drink alcohol, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. And more than 90% of this alcohol is consumed by excessive alcohol consumption. This answers the legal question of why the drinking age is 21, but what was the underlying logic of the original policy? Did lawmakers simply pick 21 out of a hat because they wanted seniors to learn the nuances of bar culture before graduation? Almost. The concept of a person reaching the age of 21 dates back centuries in English common law; 21 was the age at which a person could, among other things, vote and become a knight. Given that a person was an official adult at the age of 21, it seemed reasonable that he could drink even then. Only seven countries are as old as the United States, which begs the question: Why is ours so high? After prohibition, nearly all states introduced a legal drinking age (MLDA) of 21. However, between 1970 and 1975, 29 states lowered the MLDA to 18, 19 or 20, mostly in response to the change in voting age. Studies conducted at the time showed that motor vehicle accidents among young people increased as states lowered their MLDA.
In addition, the “blood boundaries” between states with different MLDAs came to public attention after high-profile accidents in which underage teens drove to a neighboring state with a lower MLDA, drank legally, and crashed on their way home. Stakeholders called on states to increase their MLDA to 21. Some did so in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but others did not. To promote a national drinking age, Congress enacted the National MLDA. A review of the United States The General Accounting Office, conducted in 1988, found that raising the drinking age reduced alcohol consumption among adolescents, driving after drinking alcohol, and alcohol-related motor vehicle accidents among adolescents. Believe it or not, Franklin Roosevelt helped bring about change in a rather cumbersome way. FDR approved lowering the minimum age for conscription from 21 to 18 during World War II. When conscription came out of the Vietnamese era, people were naturally a little upset that 18-year-old men were mature enough to fight, but not old enough to vote. In 1971, states ratified the 26th Amendment, which lowered the voting age to 18. Lawmakers have begun to apply the same logic to alcohol consumption. The drinking age, which the 21st Amendment placed under the responsibility of each state, began to decline across the country. In the years following the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, alcohol consumption fell by 19 per cent among 18- to 20-year-olds and by 14 per cent among 21- to 25-year-olds.
This was particularly interesting because research has shown that most minors report that alcohol is “fairly easy” or “very easy” to obtain. When it comes to alcohol, even small behavioral checks seem important, Glasner-Edwards says. “If it takes more effort, it saves the person some time to think about how important it is for them to drink at that time or to consider the possible negative consequences of alcohol consumption,” she explains. “It seems that these barriers are significant for young people to benefit from these minimum age laws.” Congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act in 1984, which sets the legal purchasing age at 21. While this age may seem a bit random (maybe even arbitrary), since you`re a legal adult at 18, Congress didn`t just choose the number of a hat. There is a long and rich history about alcohol in America and why the legal drinking age is set at 21. Late 1960s and 1970s: lowering of the drinking age. In the late 1960s and 1970s, nearly all states lowered the drinking age to 18. This led to a dramatic increase in alcohol-related car accidents, and drunk driving was considered a public health crisis. In the mid-1970s, 60 percent of all road deaths were alcohol-related, according to the National Institute of Health (NIH). More than two-thirds of car accidents involving people aged 16 to 20 were alcohol-related. 1933- Late 1960s: After prohibition.
In December 1933, the 21st Infantry Division was re-elected. Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that lifted the ban. Most states set their drinking age at 21, but some set it lower.