From The Journal of Preventive Medicine (November 2015):
Excessive drinking cost the U.S. $249.0 billion in 2010, or about $2.05 per drink. Government paid for $100.7 billion (40.4%) of these costs. Binge drinking accounted for $191.1 billion (76.7%) of costs; underage drinking $24.3 billion (9.7%) of costs; and drinking while pregnant $5.5 billion (2.2%) of costs. The median cost per state was $3.5 billion. Binge drinking was responsible for >70% of these costs in all states, and >40% of the binge drinking–related costs were paid by government.
Doing a little math here … US population in 2010 was 309.34 millions (courtesy a pastiche of data by Google) … so … divide the cost by the population to get … $804 per capita … and that, of course, is on the undifferentiated US population. I, for example, have two-three glasses of wine per annum, no beer or other liquors. I’m somewhat leary of counting children out of this study, though. PopSugar.com reports on an National Center for Health Statistics study:
Six out of 10 adults drink alcohol, while nearly 25 percent responded that they were lifetime abstainers. Men are more likely to list themselves as current drinkers than women.
For our napkin math, we’ll go with the 60% figure, so 60% of 309.34 is 185.604 millions, changing our answer to … $1341, give or take.
Well, I thought $249 billion in booze damage was a little crazy, but broken down to a per drinker calculation, it’s not out of line. Heart breaking, maybe, having lost my maternal grandparents to alcoholism and smoking, but not surprising.
(h/t NewScientist 24 October 2015)
