Joe Aldeguer

Home Owners Advocacy Centers Impairment can result from a number of things.
Alcohol

Well known is the fact that the consumption of alcohol can cause impairment. Perhaps less recognized is that fact that impairment rises gradually at lower levels but dramatically at higher levels of blood alcohol concentration (BAC). About half of auto fatalities involve drivers with BACs of .16 or higher. Impairment occurs at lower levels, but it's especially important to prevent driving with high BACs.

Researchers at the Center of Alcohol Studies at Rutgers University found that raising the drinking age to 21 simply shifted fatalities from those aged 18 to 20 to those aged 21 to 24. They concluded, on the basis of their exhaustive federally-funded study, that drinking experience, not drinking age, is the most important factor. 1

Joseph Aldeguer : This suggests that young people should learn to drink in moderation before learning to drive. Inexperienced drinking combined with inexperienced driving appears to be a highly dangerous mix.

This is not a strange or radical idea. Italians, Greeks, Spaniards, Jews, Portuguese and many others around the world teach their children how to drink in moderation as pre-schoolers. What's a strange and radical idea is imposing a minimum drinking age of 21. Of all the nations of the entire world, the U.S.is the only country to maintain this extreme social experiment. The other countries that have tried it (Ukrainia and South Korea) have concluded that it doesn't work and have abandoned it.

I write as a college president and parent who knows that one beer is his limit before going to sleep.

All around me - at my own college and those across the country - I see drinking by students: some of it responsible, some of it not. Many of those who drink on this and every other campus are not yet 21. Indeed, we believe that some of our heaviest drinkers are freshmen. One student told the dean of students that he was shocked to find that college students drink almost as much as the high school students he knew.