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“ In his 1979 history, The Alcoholic Republic, the historian W. J. Rorabaugh painstakingly calculated the stunning amount of alcohol early Americans drank on a

“ In his 1979 history, The Alcoholic Republic, the historian W. J. Rorabaugh painstakingly calculated the stunning amount of alcohol early Americans drank on a daily basis. In 1830, when American liquor consumption hit its all-time high, the average adult was going through more than nine gallons of spirits each year.” I think I remember hearing a similar stat on the ken burns prohibition doc. I didn’t quite understand why it was supposed to be that much though. 9 gallons of liquor is 36 liters is roughly 100 bottles of wine equivalent per year so less than a third of a bottle of wine a day which is what 1 or 2 glasses per meal equivalent? So the question then is are people drinking liquor drinking wine on top plus cider apparently? Or is it just a lot because that’s the average and plenty of people aren’t drinking much at or at all and that makes for the right tail of the distribution to be really drinking a lot?

rkk3 5y ago
9 Gallon is 34 Liters, 11 drinks per Liter of Vokda/Liquor 9*11 = 374 drinks per year or 1 drink a day Its probably that Average/mean drinking amount isn't a good statistical representation when almost all the consumption is done by the top 10% of drinkers. Historical comparisons also are tricky because sizes and %'s aren't consistent to today. Beer/Cider weren't as strong and bottle's of wine were smaller than 750ml etc etc.
- thebean11 5y ago
  Where are you getting 11 drinks per liter of vodka? I'm getting twice that (1.5oz shots)
  - beckingz 5y ago
    The joke being that "2 shots of vodka" is more like 4-5.
  - rkk3 5y ago
    You're right, looks like I grabbed that too quickly. They were citing for standard drinks/pours.
- ska 5y ago
  Okrent had it calculated at equivalent to 7 US gallons of pure ethanol/yr (1830s) to normalize this. So approx 17.5 gallons at today's standard of 40%. Which is about 2250 standard (1.5oz) drinks a year, or average of 6/day. There are higher and lower estimates too, but anyway you work the calculations, it's a lot.
Someone 5y ago
Wine isn’t a spirit (nor is beer). That number is about distilled alcohol. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquor: “Liquor or spirit (also distilled alcohol) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, or vegetables that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. […] Liquor generally has an alcohol concentration higher than 30%” ⇒ For a 10% alcohol wine, multiply that by a factor of (at least) 3. That makes it a bottle of wine a day. Also, it was the average adult. Women likely consumed less alcohol. If so, the average adult male must have consumed more.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- soperj 5y ago
  They already did that when they said 36 liters, which is 100 bottles of wine.

rkk3 5y ago

9 Gallon is 34 Liters, 11 drinks per Liter of Vokda/Liquor 9*11 = 374 drinks per year or 1 drink a day Its probably that Average/mean drinking amount isn't a good statistical representation when almost all the consumption is done by the top 10% of drinkers. Historical comparisons also are tricky because sizes and %'s aren't consistent to today. Beer/Cider weren't as strong and bottle's of wine were smaller than 750ml etc etc.

thebean11 5y ago
Where are you getting 11 drinks per liter of vodka? I'm getting twice that (1.5oz shots)
- beckingz 5y ago
  The joke being that "2 shots of vodka" is more like 4-5.
- rkk3 5y ago
  You're right, looks like I grabbed that too quickly. They were citing for standard drinks/pours.
ska 5y ago
Okrent had it calculated at equivalent to 7 US gallons of pure ethanol/yr (1830s) to normalize this. So approx 17.5 gallons at today's standard of 40%. Which is about 2250 standard (1.5oz) drinks a year, or average of 6/day. There are higher and lower estimates too, but anyway you work the calculations, it's a lot.

Someone 5y ago

Wine isn’t a spirit (nor is beer). That number is about distilled alcohol. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquor: “Liquor or spirit (also distilled alcohol) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, or vegetables that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. […] Liquor generally has an alcohol concentration higher than 30%” ⇒ For a 10% alcohol wine, multiply that by a factor of (at least) 3. That makes it a bottle of wine a day. Also, it was the average adult. Women likely consumed less alcohol. If so, the average adult male must have consumed more.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
soperj 5y ago
They already did that when they said 36 liters, which is 100 bottles of wine.