11 ways good drivers lose their licenses

Bad drivers probably shouldn't be on the road. On this point, people agree.

Lawmakers, though, have added their own logic. They think many good drivers shouldn't be on the road either, like those who litter or fail to vaccinate the dog.

Dozens of no-no's unrelated to highway safety can get your license yanked.

"It's evolved into something that is used to gain social conformance," says Rob Mikell, a former prosecutor and now commissioner of the Georgia Department of Driver Services. "But at some point it began to overwhelm the system."

The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) estimates that about 7 percent of U.S. drivers have a suspended license at any given time. Of those 15 million drivers, 39 percent lost their licenses for reasons that had nothing to do with driving. (See “ .”) A large number of them will need to ask their insurance companies to file an as part of their path toward license reinstatement.

What kinds of reasons? Read on. (For a look at laws by state, see " .")

Unpaid parking tickets

Laws vary by state. A violation that triggers a license suspension in New York may not do so in Oklahoma. But every jurisdiction in the United States and Canada has at least some - or many - laws on the books that suspend driving privileges for things that have nothing to do with driving.

"The legislatures have been thinking it would be a good idea to encourage people to pay their fines," says Nichole Yunk Todd, a founding director of Wisconsin's Center for Driver's License Recovery and Employability. "We cannot find a state that doesn't do it."

One of the most common ones is for unpaid parking tickets. Given that late fees typically accrue, and a suspension can last until the fine is paid, you sure don't want to land a $600 ticket in Seattle or a $1,000 ticket in San Francisco.

Borrowing the wrong car

Molly Gena, a lawyer with the Legal Action of Wisconsin, had a client who lost her license after the relative's car she'd borrowed was stopped for suspended registration.

What many people don't know is that tickets for vehicle violations are issued to whomever is driving the car at the time. This is true even if it's an equipment violation, and even if the driver has no way of knowing about it.

"The vehicle was not registered because of parking tickets," says Gena. "It was a family member's car. But she didn't know."

The woman, a single mother, was unable to pay a $200 ticket that followed, and her license was suspended for two years. She landed a good job shortly thereafter, but without transportation had to quit.

Possessing alcohol as a juvenile

"Even if there's no driving involved, that's a common license suspension," says Mikell, the former prosecutor.

He doesn't supports kids drinking and driving, of course. But this suspension affects teens caught with booze even when there is no car in sight. Teens can also be denied driving privileges for a prior incident of tobacco possession or truancy.

"There's a public policy reason that their license is suspended, not a public safety reason," says Gena, the defense lawyer.

Driving without insurance

In 32 states, judges can suspend someone's license the first time they are caught driving without insurance. In seven states, first-time offenders can also be jailed.

The Consumer Federation of America, which asserts that many drivers are uninsured because they can't afford the cost, found that states with harsh penalties for uninsured drivers don't enjoy lower rates of uninsured drivers, indicating that suspensions don't serve their intended purpose.

Opponents aren't suggesting people drive uninsured vehicles. Rather, they argue, license suspensions inhibit people's ability to pay for the necessary insurance. Someone whose driver's license is suspended cannot legally drive a friend's, family member's or employer's automobile, making it difficult to find and keep a job.

Bounced check, bad check

Many of the infractions that trigger a license suspension revolve around unpaid bills. Create a big enough carrot - in this case a driver's license - and people will pay. So goes the thinking.

But try getting a job to pay those bills without a license, say opponents.

A survey by Rutgers University found that 42 percent of respondents lost their jobs after losing their driver's license. Of those, 45 percent were unable to land a new job. For those that did, 88 percent took a drop in pay.

"Even if you don't need to drive to get to work, driver's licenses are being used by employers as a screening method for employment," says Yunk Todd, a founding director of the Center for Driver's License Recovery and Employability.

Litter, overdue library books and more

Mikell, of the Georgia Department of Driver Services, says it's rare for judges to suspend driver's licenses for things like overdue library books. Once unpaid fines mount, however, people's licenses are at risk, regardless of whether they pose a risk to other drivers.

An analysis of federal crash data by the AAMVA found that 7 percent of drivers suspended for reasons unrelated to driving ended up getting a moving violation later, compared with 34 percent of those suspended for driving-related reasons.