Posted on 01/23/2005 2:55:16 PM PST by Aussie Dasher
KNOCKING back a regular pint of beer or a glass of wine is costing an average family $80 a week, new research shows.
Over a year, a family of four spends about $4135 on alcohol, guzzling on average 44 slabs of beer, 14 bottles of spirits and 77 bottles of wine. The research, by drug rehabilitation centre Odyssey House Victoria, shows a family consisting of two parents and two teenagers would on average consume 37 litres of pure alcohol in a year.
The family's alcohol consumption would equate to 883 stubbies of medium and full strength beer, 77 bottles of wine, 311 bottles of pre-mix drinks, 8.4 casks of wine, 14 bottles of spirits and 171 stubbies of low alcohol beer.
Beer accounts for more than 45 per cent of the family's annual alcohol budget, while bottled wine consumes 22 per cent of spending.
Odyssey House is releasing the research to promote its On The Wagon Week campaign next month, which encourages people to give up alcohol for a week and donate the money instead.
Odyssey House chief executive David Crosbie said the average consumption figures were probably an underestimate because 15 per cent of Australians did not drink at all.
Despite the relatively large quantity of average alcohol consumption, Mr Crosbie said it would not be too much of a problem if it was being drunk in an appropriate way.
"The key question is how is it consumed," he said.
"If people are just having a couple of drinks every night, then across four people there is unlikely to be much harm being done.
"But, if as many Australians do, they don't drink much during the week and then drink most of it on the weekend, then there's a problem."
Mr Crosbie said some of the most notable changes in the way people drank alcohol was the growing consumption by women and the way alcohol had become a household staple.
"It's almost become a grocery product in a way, people shop for it in the same way they do their milk and bread," he said.
"The other trend is that young women have really caught up with men in their drinking."
How does this shape up against the American taste for a sip?
we'll spend that much on Super Bowl sunday........lol
My guess would be that Australian, and for that matter, European alcohol consumption, well outstrips American consumption. A larger percentage of Americans than Australians are teetotalers, and many others consume sparingly. DWI laws being what they are, one mistake can set you back several thousand dollars in lawyers' fees and court costs.
What the hell is a slab?
A slab is 24 cans of beer...better known as a damn good start!
"The other trend is that young women have really caught up with men in their drinking."
But, but, don't we want them to be "equal"?
My friends and I will slam down about $4000 during the Patriots game tonight.
I'll drink to that.
I must admit my consumption may rise a "little" when the football season comes around.
After the Tigers' performance last year, alcohol maybe the only thing to get me through...
We spend $0 on alcohol in our teetotalling household. But we're weird.
This whole thread reminds me of the Monty Python Australian Philosophers sketch (the Bruces):
"To Australians, American beer is like making love in a canoe...
"F***ing close to water."
LOL! I won't say anything in case I say something!!!
That accurately describes Foster's Beer.
Really? I never had it, but I always assumed Foster's Lager was supposed to be potent.
G'day, Dasher. What time is it there?
My wife and two adult daughters drink a glass of wine on Christmas eve. Our two sons and I don't drink.
We call them winos.
They only have one glass each year? Wow.
I guess they haven't heard all the studies "conclusively" demonstrating that having one drink a day will make them healthy, wealthy, wise, etc. < /sarcasm>
Fast approaching 5 in the afternoon...nearly knockoff time!
Well, have a good evening, then! Talk to you later.
It's nearly midnight here in frozen Minnesota. About time for bed.
Due to daylight saving, we've still got a few hours to enjoy the brilliant sunshine beating down on us. The next couple of days are for temperatures in the high thirties (somewhere around 100 on your scale).
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