BIO

Cliff Mason is the author of Millennial Money. He is the Senior Writer of CNBC's Mad Money with Jim Cramer, and has been that program's primary writer, in cooperation with and under the supervision of Jim Cramer, since he began at CNBC as an intern during the summer of 2005. Mason was the author of a column at TheStreet.com during 2007, which he describes as "hilarious, if short-lived." He graduated from Harvard College in 2007. It was at Harvard that Mason learned to multi-task, mastering the art of seeming to pay attention to professors while writing scripts for Mad Money. Mason has co-written two books with Jim Cramer: Jim Cramer's Mad Money: Watch TV, Get Rich and Stay Mad For Life: Get Rich, Stay Rich (Make Your Kids Even Richer). He is 100% responsible for any parts of either book that you did not like. Mason has also had a fruitful relationship with Jim Cramer as his nephew for the last 23 years and will hopefully continue to hold that position for many more as long as he doesn't do anything to get himself kicked out of the family.

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Jan.23

5:25 PM ET

Friday, 23 Jan 2009

Is It Time To Change The Nation's Legal Drinking Age?

Posted By:Cliff Mason

Topics:Laws and Legislation | Barack Obama | Stock Market

Now that people are making wish-lists for the new administration, lowering the drinking age keeps popping up as one of the most common suggestions.

I think our national drinking age is an absolute travesty of justice.

The fact that Americans are allowed to smoke cigarettes, join the army, and vote for politicians (you tell me what's more dangerous) at the age of 18, but we can't drink until we hit 21 is unfair, unreasonable, and probably unconstitutional.

I'd even call it oppressive.

In principle, there's no legitimate rationale for keeping the drinking age at 21, it's just wrong. But in practice, and it kills me to say this, the drinking age should stay where it is. We have the right policy, even if it's for all the wrong reasons.

So what's the right reason, or have I just lost my mind? Here's the deal: no matter what, when you throw a bunch of people in their late—teens and early-twenties together at college, they're going to want to engage in illicit behavior. Or to put it more bluntly, they want to break the rules and get messed up. That's probably even more true of at least some kids in high school.

We have a choice.

What do we want that behavior to be? Drinking? Or something else? When proponents of lowering the drinking age say that making alcohol illegal for the under-21 crowd only increases its appeal, they're absolutely right.

They think that's a reason to lower the drinking age, but I believe just the opposite.

If alcohol stops being the forbidden fruit, then believe me, something else will replace it. Maybe marijuana, which might turn out to be a net positive as, unlike alcohol, it's not addictive and it's not a poison. Or maybe you'll get lots of college students experimenting with hard drugs that no one has any idea how to handle.

By making it illegal for people under 21 to drink, we ensure that alcohol is the de facto illicit substance that young people are drawn to. Make alcohol legal for people under 21 and it will lose its "contraband appeal." Something else will fill that vacuum, and it will probably be worse than whiskey.

In a perverse way our ridiculous drinking age keeps people from experimenting with, and getting addicted to, hard drugs.

Sometimes the unintended consequences are the best ones.