What The Feds Should Have Done, And Still Should Do, About "Blood Borders"

When the infamous National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 was passed, coercing all states to raise their legal drinking ages to 21 or else lose 10% of their federal highway funding, one of the specious arguments in favor of it was that by establishing a uniform minimum drinking age, it would eliminate the problem of "blood borders".  That is, it would end the perverse incentive of young people from states with a higher drinking age from driving to neighboring states with lower drinking ages to drink, then driving back drunk.  And, rightly or wrongly, that was one of the biggest selling points of the new law.  

But there was always more than one way to skin that particular...well, you know.  States' rights arguments aside, while a uniform minimum drinking age would indeed eliminate that particular perverse incentive to drive drunk (and to drive a longer distance drunk at that), that age limit need not be 21.  After all, 21 is completely arbitrary, and as we have seen from numerous studies including, but not limited to, the ones below, it is not really backed by sound science.

Naor and Nashold (1975)
Colon and Cutter (1983)
Colon (1984)
Males (1986)
Asch and Levy (1987)
Asch and Levy (1990)
Dee and Evans (2001)
Males (2008)
Miron and Tetelbaum (2009)
Grant (2011)
Dirscherl (2011)

Boes and Stillman (NZ) (2013)

Boes and Stillman (NZ) (2017/2024)

Dasgupta et al. (NZ) (2022)

Thus, a uniform legal drinking age of 18 would have made far more sense, and would would not only have eliminated the "blood borders" issue between states, but also largely for our very long international borders with Canada (18 or 19, depending on province) and Mexico (18) as well (which the federal 21 drinking age only exacerbated).  But even then, the states' rights issue comes up once again.  So how to resolve that?

It turns out, even that could have been resolved without such undue federal coercion.  Instead, here is what the feds should have done then, and should still do today:

• Encourage all states with higher drinking ages to lower their drinking ages to 18 via positive reinforcement.  That is, reward states that lower their drinking ages to (or maintain their drinking ages at) 18 with 10% extra highway funding per year above what the funding formula normally entitles them to, for at least ten years.  Think carrots, not sticks.
• And for states that lower it to (or maintain it at) 19, make the reward half that amount, 5% per year for five years.  States that lower it to 19 and then subsequently lower further it to 18 should then get the full 10% retroactively to when they lowered it to 19 if they do it in a timely fashion afterwards.
• Make drunk driving across state lines a federal crime.
• And last but not least, raise the federal alcohol taxes as well.  That is probably the most important policy lever that the federal government has against drunk driving and alcohol-related problems in general, and is the lowest-hanging fruit there is in that regard.

Problem solved.  After all, the "blood borders" problem was really no worse in practice that what happens when dry counties are located adjacent to wet counties.  And in such cases, we sure as hell don't blame it on the wet counties!

(Mic drop)