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Stricter DUI Laws

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Automobiles have been a huge part of American society for roughly a century. Unfortunately, many people believe that driving while under the influence of alcohol is a rather safe idea. In fact, in a 2013 study, 28.7 million people admitted to driving under the influence (MADD). This can be closely related to the fact that people do not fear being caught for driving under the influence. In order to stop this, it is up to state and federal legislature to address the problem of drunk driving by imposing stricter laws similar to those of other countries who have far better success.
There are many names for driving under the influence. These include driving while intoxicated, drunk driving or impaired driving (The Real Consequences). However, …show more content…
In order to understand how effective the introduction of stricter DUI laws is, we must look at the statistics of our country and those of other countries. Let’s begin with the United States. In the U.S. the highest legal blood alcohol concentration (BAC) a person can have in most states is .15 while in others it is .08 (Comoreanu). While this may seem like a low BAC, in other countries it ranges from zero tolerance to .02 (Comoreanu). As far as punishment goes, the most a person is fined in the United States for driving under the influence is 2,500 dollars and the lowest is no fine, and for jail time many states require no jail time while others require very little jail time (Comoreanu). In other countries, these punishments are much more serious. For example in El Salvador, “anyone with a BAC over .01, their license is immediately suspended and your vehicle is seized” (DUI laws). In France, you would have your car impounded, and your license suspended for a maximum of three years. Similarly, in Russia, a first time offender could have their license suspended for two years (DUI laws). In order to see the correlation between stricter laws and drunk driving let’s look at the percentage of road accidents involving alcohol. In the United States the percentage was at a 31 percent while in Russia, which has much harsher laws, the percentage was 9 percent. That is a 22 percent difference (McCarthy). As one can see, the lower percentage of road accidents due to drunk driving belongs to the country with stricter policies, which shows that by developing stricter policies we could end the drunk driving

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