In my experience working in the Bay Area, this is hardly limited to startups. I worked at over a dozen places if not more, from startups to the giant technology

In my experience working in the Bay Area, this is hardly limited to startups. I worked at over a dozen places if not more, from startups to the giant technology companies, and all but one had massive amounts of alcohol on premises and drank in the office. I've been offered drink in interviews that to me said implicitly: either drink this or you're definitely not getting the job. I've seen coworkers leave work drunk and drive. I've had friends who are recovering from cancer and shouldn't be drinking admit to me that they felt pressured. It's not an issue of whether there is a drinking problem, but how big is the drinking problem? In my experience, it's everywhere, at least in the Bay Area. I'm not sure about other areas, but I doubt they're much different. It's hardly a wonder that frat culture and brogrammers exist with this amount of drinking, nor is it a wonder that so many things are built to sub par standards, often by sub par people. It really wouldn't be that big of a deal if people were mature and tolerant of others who don't drink, not like the asshole bosses described in the article. There is a wide variety of factors why one might not drink, many of which one may not want to share: alcoholism, religion, health, doesn't like the taste, doesn't want to get retarded, needs to drive after, still needs to do work (yes this comes up often), etc. Especially for recovering alcoholics, no job is worth drinking over. Stupid assholes in charge, don't understand that and then they wonder why their company is failing when they're doing their best to keep away qualified workers.