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Comment by jamal-kumar | Hacker News Reader

One factor that's important not to overlook is that younger people, especially in developed nations, are drinking much less in recent years, even after the COVID-19 lockdown. [1] It's just not really fashionable anymore. Everyone I know under the age of 25 or so, and (A smaller amount of) older people I know as well who have grown out of thinking being drunk is fun, are looking at it more as a quick way to get fat and sad.

[1] https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2020/sep/analysis-our-survey-show...

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This sounds more like people going to pubs to get hammered instead of going there to be social. The beer gardens around here are full of people enjoying a cold one. No one goes there to get drunk. Same with the pubs (mostly). Tons of young people there. Maybe we just have a different pub culture on the continent?

How much of a business profit comes from people getting drunk though? One serious drinker might spend as much a small group of people just enjoying a beer or two.

I live in the UK and honestly from what I've seen at least nice beer gardens are doing great, and even many of the regular pubs aren't necessarily doing badly.

I think people do like going out for a drink (and certainly not just to get drunk), rather I think the bigger problem is that its become far too expensive for many.

Adults in the UK drink to get drunk, like Italian 15 year olds. It is different for young adults, who are adopting a more “continental” approach to alcohol.

Also bars got shitty prices these days. Most people pregame before they actually go out so they buy less there bc its too fucking expensive to get drunk out. Seems like prices at bars go up even faster than prices for alcohol retail.

I'm far too cheap to order more than a drink or 2 at bars, but it tends to mean I keep a bottle of something at home which makes it dangerously easy to go too fast/hard

I have always looked at it as a social activity, than sole reason to be getting drunk.

With my friends, if you wanted to get drunk, it w as s never at a pub, we were too cheap.

We would just drink at home.

In general, people are less outgoing, not specific to pubs.

Look at restaurant closures in your area, retail stores etc... I bet the pub lines up with these

Personally, the primary reason is hangovers take waaaaay too much time after 30

There's no reason hangovers should be any worse in your 30's or 40's. Hangovers are mostly the result of poor drinking habits.

Ha, and what bad drinking habits would those be? The popular answer is "drink water", but I didn't do that when I was young and I didn't have hangovers then. These days if I drink two beers and even twice as much fresh water, I'll be miserable the morning after. Consequently, I don't go to bars anymore and I buy a sixpack at the grocery store maybe two or three times a year.

This is exactly why I quit drinking and have been sober for almost 2 years. I kept finding that one or two beers and I would feel like crap or get headaches the next day. I know about the drink water trick and it didn’t help. So finally gave up drinking and don’t miss it. Also other reasons to quit as other commenters mentioned is the price. Going out for a drink costs a lot of money. Just food and a non alcoholic drink cost me over $20. A couple alcoholic drinks would cost me 1/3 days pay. I would much rather not.

I would guess that this is just because young people have more energy and healing ability, both of which deteriorate with age

Yes, such as drinking to the point of getting drunk.

I thought it was due to me drinking way less ofent and thus losing resistance. Are you sure?

btw I hear this a lot from North American/English speaking parts of the world but less in others. There seems to be more tolerance/less judgement towards drinking alcohol, its seen as an integral part of socializing, almost to a fault in some cultures. I wonder if this is some pre-emptive virtue signaling,since if you break it down, hangovers is largely the result of dehydration and loss of minerals. It might be that as you get older you retain less fluid or something, i do not know, just guessin.

having said that, i can go without drinking. you tend to increase consumption in bursts, social events. it can cause a lot of societal problems (ex. south korea/russia) and combined with tobacco (ex. south korea/japan), its right up there in terms of toxicity with combining cocaine and alcohol (dramatically/needlessly increases toxicity).

One might make the same judgement about cocaine hangovers or any substance for that matter.

> hangovers is largely the result of dehydration

This is mostly a myth.

In my experiences between Asia and Latin America, if you're going to be drinking alot on whatever occasion, it better be with a lot of food. Even Eastern Europe for instance with their famous straight vodka shots have something (In Russian, at least) called 'zakuski' which means 'Something to bite after', which means after each shot you eat a pierogi or whatnot [1]. It really does a lot to dampen the after-effects beyond what water is capable of.

You can get at most bars a full meal for around 5$ or sometimes even less. Cocaine isn't very popular with the locals, again especially the younger ones, as it's caused us a lot of societal problems (Stuff like people who don't even touch it ending up tied up in narco violence chiefly... It's just the worst vibes on top of that).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zakuski

> combining cocaine and alcohol (dramatically/needlessly increases toxicity)

Because of cocaethylene? Can't find anything online that makes it clear what the danger is.

Highly neurotoxic and cardiotoxic, actually. [1][2] Don't do that to yourself.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3550388/

[2] https://www.cureus.com/articles/73024-cocaethylene-when-coca...

This is common incorrect assumption, it's due to tolerance and consistency of drinking habits, including hydration and liver health.

This seems extremely unlikely to be true, based on personal experience and that of many other people. Sources?

The effects are great (for many but not all), and bars can be nice are if you're drunk, but the cost is just so heavy.

“I don’t drink, thanks. I just do hard drugs.”

It was always a pricey hobby and wages have stagnated. I think that was the main driver - the rest is post hoc rationalization.

Ditto with smoking.

Ever tried getting drunk in an English pub? It's surprisingly difficult.

Name your time and place. Perhaps you’re doing it wrong :)

The beer is both weak and expensive by US standards. I actually like it, you really can sit around drinking all day and not feel like a truck hit you the next.

Try the rough cider instead… you can reliably forget a whole day for under £15.

This made me chuckle

> really can sit around drinking all day

11am to 11pm, 12 hours. Standard drinking rate of 4 pints an hour. 48 pints, and maybe a fish finger sandwich and a bag of pork scratchings to soak it up.

... otherwise known as "going pro"

Monday night at the pub, thats when you see the true pros at work.

The problem is not just that the alcohol is expensive in pubs (it’s actually cheaper than a lot of European countries) but that also the alcohol in the shops is very expensive. I think that is why alcohol use has become so unpopular. Not only is it a less pleasurable drug than others, but it’s actually becoming more expensive than them, even at home

Never been there, I tend to live in countries where the average price of a bottle of ~4-8% beer or a shot of booze is around 80 cents to 2.50 USD though and I am sorry to report the drunkest shit-disturbers in the bars are British, Australian, American and Canadian tourists in that order. I think some of these lads see the price and just go insane on it, but they can't really hold their liquor, and it causes a lot of problems with them thinking they can fight people over the pettiest of reasons (There really isn't a casual bar-fight culture in most parts I hang out around in Latin America), when it often at best just ends them getting kicked out, maybe worse targeted to get robbed at gun or knifepoint on the beach, or violently mobbed on by people having none of it at worst (go home injury or the rare death). Disagreement over the rules of billiards is a consistent one surprisingly, the pockets are marked for certain balls and when you point this out they think you are trying to hustle them or something when the numbers are pretty clearly right on the table.

(Most) Local men don't make enough money to get drunk at the bar, and chances are they have a woman (mom/wife/girlfriend) waiting around to give them a hard time if they do, if they don't they're trying to find exactly that so getting too wasted spoils the mamacita-mission, and a lot of it is economic and cultural relativity for sure. Like there are some pretty heavy drunks out this way but I mostly notice that with expats, especially those who don't speak very good Spanish. It really varies from country to country though (Often when I hang out with Colombians for instance they're drinking straight shots of this stuff called aguardiente and it's HORRIBLY sugary and a guaranteed hangover, no idea how they get used to it, I won't go near it). I think more of an issue for the local binge drinkers is adulterated liquor with weird holographic labels and the occasional mass methanol poisoning [1], actually, you find a bottle of that garbage for about a dollar for 350mL and it's the worst, killed someone I knew in quite a horrible way. Home-made fruit liquor causes a lot of problems too. No idea why people continue to drink that stuff other than a lack of education.

Internationally I notice the trend however is people becoming more health-conscious and I think that's pretty great.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46423180

Personally, the whole covid situ, and working from home just taught me to go over to friends places and drink at home rather than some shitty pub with expensive drinks that I don't like.

Instagram ruined everything.

Pubs now have flower displays with a swing for the gram.

> younger people, especially in developed nations, are drinking much less in recent years, even after the COVID-19 lockdown. [1] It's just not really fashionable anymore.

and then you link to a 2020 article that analyzes drinking DURING lockdown. Well, of course it's going to be lower during lockdown in the initial phase of covid. What you've said is bloody misleading.

> Everyone I know under the age of 25 or so, and (A smaller amount of) older people I know as well who have grown out of thinking being drunk is fun, are looking at it more as a quick way to get fat and sad.

It's always binary to you people. Drinking moderately can be social and fun, but to you, it's only to get drunk and hammered and fat and sad.

To “you people” doesn’t set a constructive tone.

Would you please stop posting in the flamewar style and taking swipes at others in HN comments? You've unfortunately been doing it a lot lately. We ban that sort of account, because we're trying for a different sort of discussion here.

You can make your substantive points thoughtfully; please do that instead.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Clearly and specifically referring to binge drinking here, a major societal problem which I'm glad to see is becoming less of one.

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