From my experience visiting Germany, I noticed differences between the laws regarding drinking alcohol and the age you  can get your license. In the U.S., the minimum drinking age is 21, and after passing a driver’s test, you can get your license at 16.

In Germany, it is quite different. Laws allow beer and wine to be consumed at 16, and all other alcohol at 18, while the age you can receive your license is also 18. In return for having a lower drinking age, the procedure for getting one’s license in Germany is a lot more intense, and the test is harder to pass.

I think the laws Germany and other countries have implemented would greatly improve our current system.

According to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Global Status Report on Road Safety for 2015, the percentage of automobile deaths involving alcohol consumption was 9 percent for Germany while the U.S. had a staggering 31 percent.

The drinking age restriction in the U.S. does not stop teens from drinking in private, uncontrolled situations. Instead, it creates a stigma around alcohol, and as a result, it is viewed as a “forbidden fruit,” creating a dangerous culture surrounding alcohol. Avoiding talking about alcohol risks teens not being as educated about the dangers of binge-drinking.

At 18, we can vote and enlist in the military, yet we aren’t mature enough to have a beer. If the drinking age was lowered and the driving age was raised, it would allow our system to have a balance. In order for it to work, both changes need to be made.

A big issue with society’s attitude toward alcohol is that there is a complete separation between adults and younger people when drinking, so there is no one to teach them how to consume alcohol responsibly without overdoing it.

“So here’s a whole generation of young people learning to drink from themselves, instead of from people who have had some experience with it,” said Barrett Seaman, the current president of Choose Responsibility on Boston University (BU) Today. “That struck me as a really perverse culture and the wrong way to go about it. So I came away from that convinced that 21 was not solving the problem, it was part of the problem.”

Lowering the drinking age would break the stigma that our culture has regarding alcohol, while raising the driving age would allow teenagers to have more experience before getting behind the wheel.