KTLA’s Andy Riesmeyer didn’t ease into the topic gently – he kicked the door open with a line that landed like a stand-up punchline and a warning label at the same time: Gen-Z, he said, doesn’t really drink, doesn’t really romance, and “they don’t really drive either,” calling it a generation of “Nah.”
But the longer his report went on, the clearer it became that the joke is really just the wrapping paper around something bigger, because this isn’t simply teenagers being lazy or rebellious. Riesmeyer framed it as a shift in fear, convenience, money, and how young people even define freedom in the first place.
The hook for the segment was a “new study” and a data point that sounds almost unbelievable if you grew up thinking a driver’s license was basically a teenager’s first taste of adulthood. Riesmeyer said that back in 1983 nearly half of all 16-year-olds already had their license, but by 2022 it had dropped to less than a quarter.
That kind of slide doesn’t happen because one generation suddenly forgot what a steering wheel is. It happens when the whole culture around driving changes – what it costs, what it risks, and what it’s for.
And according to Riesmeyer, the simplest answer coming straight from many Gen-Z teens is blunt: they’re scared.
The Fear Factor Is Real, Even If Cars Are “Safer Than Ever”
One of the most interesting tensions in Riesmeyer’s report is that he calls the fear “wild,” because as he put it, cars have never been safer. He even joked about how rough a car from 1983 looks now, painting a picture of a time when safety felt optional, and the vibe was basically: everybody bounce around the back seat and hope for the best.
It’s funny because it’s true, but it also raises a question that hangs over the whole segment: if vehicles are safer, why does driving feel scarier?
Part of the answer is that “safer” doesn’t always feel safer, especially when you’re the one behind the wheel. Modern roads feel faster, denser, and more intense, and modern drivers aren’t exactly known for patience or attention, which is a terrible mix for a new driver who already feels like they’re stepping onto a moving treadmill.
Riesmeyer’s co-host Jessica Holmes hit that point in a way that probably made every parent in Southern California nod without even thinking about it. She said she learned to drive in a small town, like a lot of people did, and then basically implied that learning to drive in Los Angeles today must be terrifying.
Riesmeyer didn’t argue – he agreed. He even said that as a 37-year-old, it’s scary to drive in Los Angeles, which is a pretty telling admission, because if a grown adult who’s been doing it for decades thinks it’s stressful, it’s not hard to imagine a 16-year-old staring at a freeway on-ramp like it’s the edge of a cliff.
The point isn’t that Gen-Z is uniquely fragile. The point is that the environment they’d be learning in feels uniquely unforgiving, and fear is a normal reaction to a situation where one small mistake can turn into a major crash.
Freedom Used To Mean Keys – Now It Might Mean Apps
Riesmeyer kept circling back to the old idea of what driving represented: freedom. In his words, it used to mean getting out there, meeting up with people, and living in the real world, and he even joked about how, as a kid, he couldn’t believe he was “only halfway” to being able to drive.
That’s an emotion a lot of older millennials and Gen-Xers recognize instantly. A license wasn’t just plastic in your wallet. It was proof you could go somewhere without asking permission.
But Riesmeyer made a sharp point: the modern teen social life isn’t built the same way. He mentioned a psychologist who said teenagers used to be “really into driving” because it was how they met up with each other. That was the whole engine of it – if you wanted to see your friends, you had to move your body through space.
Now, a big chunk of social life happens at home, on screens, or in group chats, and that changes the incentive. If the hangout already lives on your phone, the pressure to master a two-ton machine just to be “with people” drops fast.
And then there’s the obvious modern replacement for teen driving: Uber. Riesmeyer pointed out that Uber simply didn’t exist when earlier generations were racing toward their permits, and he also joked about “parent Uber,” the army of moms and dads who are willing – sometimes even happy – to chauffeur their kids everywhere.
He shared a line from a Reddit story describing a son as a “21-year-old passenger prince,” which is hilarious, but also kind of revealing. If you grow up in a world where rides appear when you tap a screen, being driven around can start to feel normal, not embarrassing.
A license becomes less of a rite of passage and more like an optional add-on, like learning to use a manual can opener when you’ve always had an electric one.
The Money Problem No One Likes Talking About
There’s also a practical reason Riesmeyer and his co-hosts kept coming back to, and it’s not psychological at all – it’s financial.
Frank Buckley brought up insurance costs, and you could feel the “parent math” clicking into place as they talked it through. Adding a teen driver to an insurance plan can be brutally expensive, and for some families, it’s not just “a little more money.” It’s the difference between making rent comfortably and sweating it.
Buckley made the point that in some cases it ends up being cheaper to just send your kid in an Uber than to buy a car for them and pay the insurance.
That’s a wild thing to hear out loud because it flips the old script. It used to be: pay for a used car, maybe pay for some gas, and you’re set. Now it’s: the license might be the cheap part, and everything after it is the real bill.
Even if a teen wants to drive, parents might quietly prefer the app-based option because it’s predictable and doesn’t come with the fear of their kid learning in traffic that looks like a video game set on “expert mode.”
And that part matters, because the trend isn’t just teens deciding; it’s families deciding together, even if nobody says it that way.
The “Life Skill” Argument, And Why It Still Matters
Riesmeyer didn’t let the report end on “kids these days,” because he clearly thinks there’s a long-term risk in delaying licenses too much.
He said it straight: unless you plan to live in a handful of major cities for your whole life, you’re going to need to know how to drive, because it’s still a life skill.
That’s the part of the segment that felt less like comedy and more like advice, and I think he’s right. Even in a world of ride-shares and delivery services, there are moments where you simply need to be able to drive – job opportunities, family emergencies, picking up a sick kid, evacuations, moving, traveling, even just living somewhere that doesn’t have reliable public transit.
Depending on apps for every ride also creates a weird kind of vulnerability. If your phone dies, if prices surge, if you’re in an area with no drivers nearby, or if you’re stranded late at night, suddenly that “convenience” turns into a trap door.
And there’s another layer here that the segment hinted at without fully spelling out: confidence. Driving is one of those skills that builds the sense that you can handle the world, because it forces you to make decisions in real time and deal with consequences.
When that gets delayed, people don’t just delay a license; they sometimes delay a certain kind of adulthood, where you can’t always tap your way out of discomfort.
When Driving Anxiety Isn’t A Teen Thing
One of the most memorable parts of the KTLA discussion came when Mark Kriski shared a story about seeing a woman at a gas station crying because she was scared – she was from a small town, had rented a car, and said she couldn’t do it.
That story matters because it supports Riesmeyer’s main theme: fear isn’t limited to teenagers. Driving anxiety is real, and it can hit people of any age when they’re thrown into a big, fast, unfamiliar environment.
And to be fair, that fear isn’t irrational. A car is one of the only everyday tools that can kill you quickly if you make a mistake, and the older you get, the more you realize how many drivers around you are distracted, angry, or both.
So when Gen-Z says “I’m scared,” the grown-up response probably shouldn’t be to mock them. It should be to ask: scared of what, exactly? The speed? The traffic? The consequences? The embarrassment of messing up? The fear of other drivers? Because those are solvable problems, but only if people treat them as real.
A Different Kind Of Teenage “Rebellion”
If you zoom out, Riesmeyer’s segment makes Gen-Z’s license delay look less like apathy and more like a different kind of rebellion – one built around risk management.
Older generations chased the keys because keys meant independence. Gen-Z has grown up watching the downside of cars in high definition, with crash footage, road rage clips, and stories of distracted driving constantly floating through social feeds, and it makes sense that some of them internalize the idea that driving is danger first, freedom second.
And when you layer that fear on top of high insurance costs and the availability of Uber and constant parental driving, the old motivation collapses.
The most honest takeaway from Riesmeyer’s reporting is that Gen-Z isn’t refusing to drive because they’re “too cool.” They’re delaying because driving no longer sits in the same emotional category it used to sit in.
It used to be a prize. Now, for a lot of them, it looks like a stressful responsibility they can postpone – and in the short term, the modern world actually lets them get away with it.
But Riesmeyer’s warning hangs there at the end: sooner or later, most people still need this skill, and the longer you wait, the harder it can feel to start.
So maybe the real story isn’t “Gen-Z doesn’t want licenses.” It’s that a whole generation has been handed a road system, a cost structure, and a culture that makes the driver’s seat feel less like freedom and more like pressure – and they’re reacting exactly the way a cautious human being would.
Mark grew up in the heart of Texas, where tornadoes and extreme weather were a part of life. His early experiences sparked a fascination with emergency preparedness and homesteading. A father of three, Mark is dedicated to teaching families how to be self-sufficient, with a focus on food storage, DIY projects, and energy independence. His writing empowers everyday people to take small steps toward greater self-reliance without feeling overwhelmed.
