Manuel Viet wrote:
> ........... But we have to take a pretty serious examination
> before we're entitled to a full driving license, and you can't take that exam
> without at least 20 hours of professional lessons (excluding family training
> - while this does now exists, but the conditions are very tight, and still
> the wannabe driver needs to validate a certain amount of practicing lessons
> with a professionnal teacher, and a certain mileage in a given time).
>
> The real danger is the growing phenomenon of drivers without a license
> because
> it's becoming more and more difficult to have and keep one.
>
One of those classic dilemmas of governance. If you require a license to
eat, and make the requirements for the license so difficult that some
people can't get one, they will, for some unfathomable reason, just keep
eating. For many people, driving is necessary to economic survival,
which often seems to them, and may be, directly related to remaining alive.
We have a similar issue that's been under debate for some time in
California. There are a great many illegal immigrants living here. Many
of them drive and most of those are without insurance, since you can't
get insurance unless you are licensed to drive.
So some people want to issue drivers licenses to them. They feel it will
give some better control over who drives and how well trained and
knowledgeable they are. They also hope it will lead to many more of them
being insured, thus lowering costs for the licensed and insured drivers
who are in accidents with these unlicensed, uninsured drivers. And
possibly incidentally raising insurance company profits and/or lowering
overall rates. Obviously, these opinions tend to be held by pragmatists,
liberals, those whose livelihood depends on drivers who can't get a
license, those citizens who have non-citizen relatives who would like to
come here and possibly some insurance company executives.
Then there are those across a wide range of positions against illegal
immigration and illegals already here to varying degrees ranging from
those who would round them all up and throw them out to those who are
not too upset with those who are here doing so many things for them, but
don't want any more. They tend to figure that issuing licenses will just
make it easier for those already here and encourage more to come. Some
think the entire economy would collapse into depression and others know
that their businesses would fail, but want to stem the flow. And there
are the English only folks, who would like to make it a way to force
more immigrants, legal or not, to learn English.
I think I've covered most of the major positions, but there are many
smaller ones. Oh yes, the different opinions about whether these drivers
will be safer with the fear of loss of the license than now when they
are in fear of being caught without one.
Of course, like there, you can increase the sanctions for driving
without a license. But at least here they are largely toothless against
the majority of offenders. We have a crisis of prison overpopulation,
and there is no way we are going to fill them up even further with such
minor violations. And of course, many of these miscreants live close to
hand to mouth, so threats of monetary punishment are meaningless to them.
So you can see why no resolution has occurred. It is an ongoing source
of irritation for many and of mild amusement to others.
Now the federal govenment, which can't see a politically feasible way to
issue national identity cards (Yet?) are making an end around play by
putting requirements on states about how and to whom they issue driver's
licenses, turning them into quasi citizen ID cards.
Full disclosure, the woman born in Mexico who has been cleaning my house
every two weeks for getting on to 20 years is a US citizen and has a
driver's license.
Moose
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