"To identify the U.S. cities with the highest and lowest excessive
drinking rates, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed the percentage of adults who
report binge or heavy drinking across 381 metro areas. Metro level data
were aggregated from county level data provided by County Health
Rankings & Roadmaps, a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and University
of Wisconsin Population Health Institute joint program. All data are as
of the most recent available year. Median household income and poverty
data came from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. The
number of bars per capita came from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Health outcomes, including the number of potential lives lost per
100,000 people due to premature death annually and the percentage of
adults who report fair or poor health were also aggregated from
county-level data obtained from County Health Rankings & Roadmaps."
The embedded image (
via) shows the top ten.
Six of the next ten were also from Wisconsin. You can also view the
driest cities in the United States [think Utah], but the data are arranged in a clickbait fashion.
Is the concentration here due to cultural factors, genetic concentrations, or some other environmental factor? Anyone have any hypotheses?
ReplyDeleteA lot of cultural and ethnic influences, but also an almost inexplicable tolerance from the legal community. Not unusual in local papers to read about someone arrested for his 8th or 10th OWI (operating his car while intoxicated), but still retaining his/her car and being released back to the community.
DeleteCultural factors of a sort, perhaps. I can't speak to Wisconsin, but as a current resident of Ames, Iowa, I'll note that our population is over 50% college students. Iowa State University has a student enrollment of over 33,000, while the population of the entire city (including the college) is around 60,000.
DeleteOn the topic of culture, a large percentage of Wisconsinites are of German and Norwegian/Scandinavian ancestry. Both of those peoples have a long culture involving drinks made from malted grains. Also worth noting that several of the cities named have a collage of there own or affiliated branch of a major university.
DeleteWell the large german population that settled here had roots going back to the old country in beer manufacturing. It was as much a business that provided work as much as pleasure. Alchohol has no stigma here.
DeleteCulture for sure... very drunk state. I used to have to cross through south Wisconsin on occasion and multiple times I noted the massive amount of taverns and even suspected drunk drivers.
DeleteThanks for the insights!
ReplyDelete