I'm in the UK and it always perplexed me why the USA drinking ID laws are quite so strict. Surely people are going to get booze one way or another, and the idea is that by having some level of ID you're stopping most people from drinking underage in a bar? Most people over here start drinking in parks with mates around 13-16 and it's not big deal, if anything in my opinion it's safer they drink in pubs and bars where people can keep an eye on them.
Your country created puritanism, which it exported to the US where it continues to influence policy. The US once outright banned alcohol.
Prohibition tends not to be effective when there's broad demand for the prohibited item, especially when applied only to a small segment of society. In many places, it's customary to introduce teens to alcohol under parental supervision, which I suspect reduces later high-risk behavior.
I think part of it is the level of car use. Most places in the US, everything is quite far apart, and everyone has a car. The main way that people get home after drinking is driving. Hopefully they take an Uber or have someone else to drive them, but many times that is not the case unfortunately. So there are a lot of young people on the road or freeway on the weekends who have been drinking. And it is a fairly common cause of young people or the ones they crash into dying.
Yeah it's crazy. I think it's because the police seem to absolutely hate clubs and will turn the screw in any way they can under using the threat of taking away their license.
The data almost certainly isn't stored in any sort of secure manner, either.
They do this because the risk is very assymetrical. If someone is >18 and they ask for ID, no big deal. If someone is too young and they don't ask for ID, they risk a huge fine, criminal prosecution and possible loss of their license. So they instruct their staff to "think 25" to minimise the possibility of the latter. It's understandable.
I'm 30 and I still get asked for ID occasionally, and you know what? I don't care - because I've been on the other side. I've worked in those shitty low-paying jobs where you often have to ask people for ID and I've seen how rude, pissy and entitled people can be when you make them suffer the enormous inconvenience of flashing their ID so I can avoid the risk of getting fined thousands of pounds and fired. If you think it's such an indignity to be asked to prove you're above 18 then I suggest you spend more time working in service jobs.
Not as bad as NZ. NZ only serves beer and wine in the supermarket for starters. They have the same under 25 policy. They also have policies where if they smell alcohol on you they won't allow a sale. Not only that but if they smell alcohol on someone next to you, they won't allow the sale. Not only that but if the person next to you looks like they could be under-age and don't have ID on them then they will stop a sale. Is truly ridiculous. Once I bought some alcohol and they asked my mum for ID. My mum had me when she was 25.
