A Driver’s License — A Dying Right of Passage?

The Federal Highway Administration statistics show in 1983 over half of the 16-year olds in the U.S. had a driver’s license. In 2022 that number fell by 25%. Most eventually got their driver’s license. It just took them longer.

Dara Khosrowshahi is Uber’s CEO. He notes his company benefits tremendously from the what is being called the “Delayed Driver Trend.” While his company benefits, he doesn’t. Khosrowshahi says he can’t even get his 18-year old son to get a license.

"It drives me crazy," Khosrowshahi said. "I don't know about you, but did you get a license the minute you could drive? It was just such a thing. It was a goal in life. It represented freedom.”

Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012) is also falling way behind other generations in other social trend markers. They don’t have as much sex, they wait longer to connect with a long-term partner and start families.

And they don’t go out as much and they drink less alcohol.

Jeffrey Jensen Arnett — a professor of psychology at clark University in Massachusetts — wrote a book about this titled, "Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens Through the Twenties.” He said Gen Z socializes, shops and orders meals online. So why socialize?

"If you think of why those 16-year-olds — 30 or 50 years ago — were so eager to get their license, a lot of it had to do with wanting to drink and have sex," Arnett said.

His book notes that’s still happening but at a much slower pace. A great many Gen Z kids just aren’t in that big of a hurry to get into adulthood.

Source link: Business Insider — https://bit.ly/4aAvwPH