Shoutout to the spike in women drinking when Trump got elected
Correlation is not causation, but…
The election was 15-16. Spike happened 14-15. Wondering if it was a methodology change to jump that much in 1 year?
Also fuck me but that was already 10 years ago. Was trying to recall if there was maybe some kind of viral social media thing that might have happened in 2014.
The text is to the left on '15; zoom in and compare the circles to the year. It was a 15-16 jump according to the dots.
The dot above 2014 isn’t labeled. I’d guess it’s about 31.7%. The dot above 2015 is 36.8%. That’s far and away the largest year-over-year change and the jump I’m referring to.
2016 is the peak. But it’s only barely slightly higher than 2015.
Was there one of the several “once in a lifetime” economic crashes that year? I can’t remember, but that was my first thought.
Obligatory NYT headline: “Alcohol poisoning used to be a time honoured pasttime in this small town, but Millennial woke mob took it all away.”
I think at least part of it is due to weed. Both it being legalized and being more popular than it’s ever been in non-legal states. At least for me, smoking weed kills my desire to drink nearly as much. Usually at parties or just hang outs it starts off with a beer or mixed drink or three, then someone breaks out the weed and suddenly I’m nursing my fourth drink for an hour.
Would we not expect sudden changes then? This is a steady decline, not indicating any sudden changes in laws or anything.
Weed legalization hasn’t been sudden though. It’s progressed from medical to decriminalized to legal state by excruciating state.
As this graph is national, it makes sense that there wouldn’t be a cliff because there’s no particular date when we could say weed became legal.
Still not legal in any way here in texasss, and I assume we’ll be the very last of the last to do so. But even here, it’s so easily accessible that a good number of younger people I know tell me they prefer weed to alcohol. In legal states, that tendency must be much higher.
Weed has had a steady increase in popularity since like the 70s. I kind of agree, I’m sure there should be some cliff in the states where it was legalized, or if not my theory is bunk. It’s only based on an anecdote tbf.
Edit: actually if we want any theory it seems pretty clear that the beginning of the drop off started right about at the market crash of 2008.
Also interesting that female rates stayed steady to the point that they’ve actually overtaken male rates.
Interesting. Personally, it doesn’t kill my desire to drink when I do decide to go on a bender. If anything, for me it gets easier to drink when there’s weed involved, as I just don’t enjoy most alcoholic beverages, taste wise. However, since access to weed got easier and I don’t have to hide anymore, when the occasion to get a buzz happens, I just prefer the weed high to being drunk, and I can skip the hangover.
I think it’s also in part due to easier access at an earlier age compared to alcohol and the rapid increase in quality. Weed is easy to grow, and even kids have been selling it to their friends in school for forever. But gone are the days of buying skunk weed off some dude you barely know. There’s 13 year olds out there today smoking stuff of a quality that the hippies could only dream of.
Plus, when it comes to drugs, as a late Millennial, I knew a lot more kids who became heroin addicts as teenagers than alcoholics - and they started their drug use years before showing up on this graph. During Bush’s presidency, heroin from Afghanistan became a lot more easily accessible on the east coast, and I used to say when I was a teenager that heroin was more popular with my generation because it was too awkward to go to the bar and see your friends’ parents day drinking.
I’m not sure how it all factors in but there’s evidence that teenagers are using weed less: https://coloradosun.com/2024/06/26/youth-marijuana-use-colorado-legalization/
I’m shocked there’s no bump in 2020-2021. Many people I know, myself included, started drinking so much more during the pandemic.
These are also self reported numbers.
I know I wasn’t telling people how much I was drinking during the pandemic
It went from 50% to 30% which is less but the scale makes you feel it is much lower
Sometimes you just have to trust the audience to be literate. A 20% drop is very significant, it’s not like they’re trying to make a .5% decline look like the Temperance movement.
Yeah and also its a decline in male binge drinking. Female hasn’t really changed after a short term uptick.
