Report shows dramatic fall in young driver crashes.

16 April 2015

A new report from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention finds that the number of teen drivers involved in fatal crashes dropped by more than half over the past decade as safer vehicles hit the road and more young people received restricted licenses.

Many factors are probably at play, but researchers say there is wide agreement that graduated licensing programs are an important contributor to the decline in fatal crashes. These graduated licenses may limit teen driving at night or restrict teenage passengers, reducing the overall crash rate among the youngest teen drivers by 20 to 40% according to experts. Aided by an increase in graduated license programs, the number of drivers aged 16 to 19 involved in fatal crashes fell by 55% to 2,568 in 2013, down from 5,724 in 2004. Some of them may not be crashing because they don't have licenses yet, as more students wait until after they turn 18 to start driving. The full article is available here from Reuters. 

The full report from CDC is available here.