In quite a few parts of the world this is a lot different. For example, in Germany a 13 year old can legally have a glass of wine or a beer at home or even in a restaurant when a custodian is present, and at the age of 16 on his/her own. In Finland the drinking age is 18. It's all about what you've accustomed to.Some states experimented with lowering the drinking age to 18 and it turned out to be a big mistake.
A case in point: I have quite a few American buddies and sometimes they bring their kids over when they come to Finland. Usually my older kids of same age, 18-21, keep company to them and at some point take them to bars and clubs downtown. We all know what happens. They end up bringing, sometimes even literally carrying their guests back to our house. They're not used to going to clubs due to US drinking age of 21. When they can, it's something new, they're excited and more often than not get hammered. It's the same thing with Scandinavian teens in Germany and Austria, in popular alpine skiing destinations. Drinking age is 16, they can get into bars and clubs, go overboard with alcohol and have hangovers that can only be measured on the Richter scale. Been there and done that myself in the 80's. Seen that happen time and time again.
Not that different from Montana and "Reasonable and prudent" speed limit experiment a few years ago. It was full blown Montanabahn and was shut down shortly afterwards.
It takes a far longer time to find a real baseline; the real long-term effects of changes in legislation. US teenagers are not that different from German or Scandinavian teenagers. The arbitrary legal age for certain things is different and they just adjust their behavior accordingly. Changing the law for a few short years does little to change the learned behavior pattern; a minimum of ten years will give much more realistic perspective whether a change actually is a mistake or not. Or simply looking at how a different legislation works elsewhere and refrain from branding teenagers in another country "different" by their geographical location. In reality they rarely are.
Last edited: