It’s easy to state facts than to explain them. So, we’ll start with some basic information and then look for possible answers. Every year, at least 8,000 drivers aged between 16 and 24 manage to kill themselves by driving with too much alcohol or disabling drugs in their bodies. As if that were not enough, not less than 50,00 others will be seriously injured but avoid death. Put into a more general context, drunk driving is the biggest cause of teen death with a mere 85,000 aged between 15 and 19 managing only minor injuries. In quoting these numbers, which are repeated year in, year out, we are not implying the police are ineffective. Young drivers are the group must likely to be arrested for dwi/dui offenses.

These numbers suggest a major cultural problem that’s not eased by policing. Nor is it affected when colleges and universities impose limits on the availability of alcohol at “official” functions. A dozen states impose a curfew on teen drivers. Yet the number of injuries and deaths remains steady. There seems to be a genuine resistance from teens to the idea they should say “no” to drinking and driving. Even states which divert additional resources to police patrols in the hope of increasing the chances of detecting and arresting drunk drivers have made no impact. Teens seem not to care whether they are arrested. Fear of punishment is not a deterrent. Worse, where the teens are supposedly responsible for paying their own insurance premiums, many ignore the law and drive uninsured.

This has two consequences. For parents who assume the burden of paying the premiums for their teens, the premium rates strain the family budget at a time when the recession lingers on and unemployment remains high. In the majority of states, the increasing risk of being hit by an uninsured or underinsured driver is also rising fast and should be protected against. For those teens and young adults under the age of 24 who opt to pay their own premiums, the rates are a sobering reminder of the terrible price we are paying for the number of accidents and death on our roads. Although younger drivers will earn discounts by building up a record of safe driving, avoiding tickets and accidents, all younger drivers pay higher premiums than adults who learn driving later in life. It’s not a question of driving experience. It’s about attitude. Second, auto insurance rates are becoming an instrument of public policy. Although high premiums do force some to refuse insuring their vehicles, the insurance companies are using price to try forcing younger drivers to act more responsibly. When the police and education services have failed to make an impression on youth culture, it’s left to the auto insurance industry to start high and then offer discounts to the young who are prepared to drive safely. It should not have to work this way. Somehow parents or other authority figures should be able to change the behavior of the young. But, when all else fails, it comes down to simple economics. Young drivers are bribed into driving more carefully.