Quote:
Originally Posted by WhiteTiger
Which sounds really sad, that we have so much possible intoxicated driving that it's such a drain on societal resources.
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It is dismaying that it's such a common occurrence that it takes up much of our legal resources. But we should also recognize that we're doing something right here - it's not as though drunk driving hasn't decreased in the last 30 years.
The problem is that we've pretty much reached the limit of what we can achieve with public awareness and social norms. Now we're down to a hard core of very young and dumb drivers, and older alcoholics, who can't be influenced by appeals to being responsible and law-abiding citizens. The only way to deter people who are still driving drunk is to catch them in the act. And that's very expensive. The number of check stops set up in Calgary in a week is pitifully low, because police are very expensive. So are prosecutors and judges. Basically, we don't want to spend the money it would take to catch and prosecute the morons who still drive drunk.
Seeing as we don't want to spend the money, I don't expect any dramatic decrease in impaired driving to happen until self-driving cars take over the roads. Which can't happen soon enough.