LaCorte-1 Jacob LaCorte Mrs.

Simon English Language Arts 3-4 H December 2, 2013 Research Based Closing Argument on Drinking Age A lot of people would attempt to argue that if you're old enough to protect our country, then you're old enough to drink. However, the law is based on facts and numbers, and it is there for a reason. The drinking age should not be lowered from twenty one because the law has saved approximately twenty thousand lives since 1987, lowered the amount of people who depend on alcohol, and decreased the amount of underage drinkers. When the drinking age was still eighteen, there were many car crashes associated with drunk driving. Today, there are still many drunk accidents, but the difference is how many. According to Laura Dean-Mooney, since the twenty one law was enacted, the number of young people killed annually was cut almost in half from over five thousand in the early 1800s to around two thousand individuals in 2005. All these numbers do is support that the drinking age should remain where it is. Any counter argument would show no benefit if supported by facts. Alcohol dependency grows much stronger when you start at a young age. According to Dan Lyons, those who dont drink till their twenty one have sixty percent less dependency later on. The earlier a person starts using alcohol, the more he will become addicted When the drinking age was eighteen there were a lot more minors able to get their hands on alcohol. Since the age went up thirty five percent less youths are drinking. (Lyons) When less youths drink, less people become addicted to alcohol. Therefore, the drinking age reduced the dependency rates by sixty percent.
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LaCorte-2 As mentioned above, the amount of young people who drink was much higher when the age was eighteen. Because of this law, less youths drink which also mean less youths damaging their developing brains. According to Lyons, Lowering the drinking age to 19 in Arizona increased youthful drinking by thirty five percent. Therefore more young people will probably end up successful in life. All thanks to the twenty one drinking age.
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The facts are clear and up for grabs. A lower drinking age would harm society in several different ways. Many people want to lower the drinking age for selfish reasons, but they are blind to the beneficial products of keeping the age right where it is. Therefore it would be unwise to lower the drinking age to eighteen.
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LaCorte-3 Annotated Bibliography Dean-Mooney, Laura. "A Lower Age Would Be Unsafe." Ebscohost. Ebscohost, 15 Sep 2008. Web. 3 Dec 2013. Lyons, Dan. "Don't Lower Drinking Age."Ebscohost. Ebscohost, 08 Dec 2008. Web. 3 Dec 2013.