[schnellman]

I drove the autobahn every day for ten years and there are three reasons why it is relatively safe: (1) German drivers spend months, sometimes years learning to drive before they are issued a driver's license. (2) Germans are the most disciplined drivers in the world. They always signal their intentions and they understand lane discipline. It's a driving violation to not get over for a faster car. (3) Most (not all) of their cars are designed to run safely on the autobahn.
Having said that, they also have some of the most horrendous crashes in the world with dozens of cars and dozens of fatalities in a single incident. The most frequent cause of these accidents is fog. Drivers often don't slow down enough and since you can't see enough to gauge your speed, drivers often speed on into the fog and then into each other.
Giving a 15 or 16 year old a driver's license after they pass a simple written test and drive around the block is ridiculous at best and criminal at worst. Just look at the statistics.

Just my 2 cents!