Coding with Fountain Pens

Taking aim at a longstanding rite of passage for 16-year-olds, an influential auto safety group is calling on states to raise the age for getting a driver’s license to 17 or even 18.

Adrian Lund, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a research group funded by the auto insurance industry, acknowledged the idea is “a tough sell,” but noted that car crashes are the leading cause of death among teenagers.

“The bottom line is that when we look at the research, raising the driving age saves lives,” Lund said.

I don’t doubt it. But why stop there?  Think of all the lives that could be saved if the driving age was raised to 50.  Do teenagers die on the road at greater rates than other age groups, or do they just have lower mortality from other causes?  Even if they do have a higher auto-death rate, what is the cause?  Inexperience on the road perhaps?  If the driving age was raised to 18, wouldn’t that then increase the number of fatalities in the now inexperienced 18-20 age group?