Really Stupid Ideas #1

[drplokta]

First in an occasional series pointing out why ideas that are under discussion are stupid.

Today, we look at setting a minimum price per unit for alcohol. This is a stupid idea because it immediately turns (formerly) cheap booze into a massively profitable line for the supermarkets, with no price competition to worry about. This means that they will spend tens of millions promoting it, and sales may even increase.

The smart thing to do instead is to increase tax, bring tax levels more into line with alcohol content, and perhaps prohibit selling alcohol at below cost price as the government is proposing (although this, while not actively stupid, is very difficult since the government has no way to find out what cost price is).

Comments

[andrewducker]

Not to mention that minimum pricing is probably against EU law.

And yes, does that mean that a company can't sell alcohol wholesale for less than they bought it for? That makes "going out of business" sales tricky.

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

Also, there is alcohol in a lot of products that aren't usually used to get drunk on. Would this cause the price of toothpaste, cooking wine and 100 other random products to skyrocket as well?

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Toothpaste?

Now mouthwash, yes.

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

Signal tooth paste in the United States has alcohol in it.

I only know this because about 15 years ago some school teachers had the brilliant idea to brethalyze every single student who came to the prom under the threat that anyone to blew positive for booze would not be welcome at graduation.

10 girls who were later able to prove they had not been drinking at all - but had simply brushed their teeth right before getting in the limo were excluded from graduation, sued the school and got a shitfuck of money.

Mostly because the school released their names to local newspapers and did everything they could to hurt their reputations.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

So we're looking at something with a high enough alcohol content to be detectable in the mouth immediately after use, when explicitly looked for by a bunch of shitheads.

That's a pretty low content threshold. Having just checked a mouthwash (alcohol content clearly signalled) and toothpaste (not mentioned), I think you'd find the effect on toothpaste per se would be negligible. I've also not noticed any special toothpastes on sale at Muslim grocers.

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

Mouthwash is also mildly alcoholic, IIRC.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Which they clearly signal on the contents.

(There are alcohol-free ones, but Listerine lists alcohol as a major ingredient. After that mysterious aqua stuff.)

A dose of mouthwash is also considerably larger than a dose of toothpaste, which also means that the mouthwash manufacturers would have a much bigger problem than the toothpaste ones.

(Well, assuming they're not the same people.)

I wonder if those girls had actually had used a mouthwash after brushing their teeth. That would much more plausible to me, but without a citation, it's difficult to know.

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

I wonder if those girls had actually had used a mouthwash after brushing their teeth.

That had certainly occurred to me.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

A quick look around indicates that there is a fairly common alcohol in toothpaste after all - sorbitol (an artificial sweetener). It isn't ethanol, but it might have been that that showed positive in the tests, depending on how exactly those tests worked.

(I think we may assume that any alcohol tax won't be targetting sorbitol.)

[armb.livejournal.com]

The worst case is possibly that products where the alcohol can't safely be drunk won't go up in price, and alcoholics will be more likely to drink it anyway than if cheap drinking alcohol was available. (Mouthwash, cologne, methylated spirits, etc.)

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

All raising alcohol price does it help make poor people even more poor.

[feorag.livejournal.com]

It already is taxed the way you say. Alcohol duty is calculated based on the quantity of actual alcohol, in litres, the producer makes (or is imported, which is done under duty suspension and the importer gets to pay it). There are different rates for different products - spirits are taxed at a higher rate than beer, and alcopops are taxed at a higher rate to discourage them. There are benefits for smaller producers - progressive beer duty for small brewers and an exemption altogether for tiny (farmhouse scale) cider producers.

I often joke that perry should be taxed at the current preferential rate, but that "pear cider" should be on the alcopop scale - the difference being, of course, marketing. Perhaps we should start getting tough about what is allowed to be called, and taxed as, cider (for example), which will automatically shove the cheap (problematic) stuff, full of onions, sugar and adjuncts, into the alcopop category?

For a beer to be called "lager", and taxed as a beer, perhaps we should insist it come up to Rheinheitsgebot standards and be stored for 30 days. Otherwise - it's an alcopop! Stella Artois (which contains rice) would be "reassuringly even more expensive"! I am sure that it would be easy enough to come up with standards that emphasise quality and make cheap piss more expensive.

The whole problem with this entire discourse is that it appears that only the drinking of poor people that is a problem. Also, in the UK, it seems we're drinking less anyway, and the trend was downwards through the last century too). Additionally, after two trips to Oslo in 6 months, I am absolutely sure that the price of alcoholic drinks makes no difference.

Or maybe, just maybe, we should examine why people's lives are so shitty and stressful that they feel the need to drink so much, instead of blaming them? (and another clue, as I learned from the month of no beer, there isn't actually that much else to do at night unless you are really well off and have boring ideas of what constitutes entertainment).

[andrewducker]

Or maybe, just maybe, we should examine why people's lives are so shitty and stressful that they feel the need to drink so much, instead of blaming them?

This.

[evil-mogwai.livejournal.com]

"The whole problem with this entire discourse is that it appears that only the drinking of poor people that is a problem".

One of the papers did a survey not long ago that concluded it was moving more towards Lower Middle Class that were more of a problem on the streets and drinking to excess.

Its a perception think with some of the toffs, sorry upper class, that are involved with policy that it is more the gutter classes causing the problem.

Health costs are caused in the gutter classes too but they don't show up as much as the lower middle classes would because, I believe, that they seek out healthcare for lesser issues.

/I may be wrong with some of the above... it is purely an opinion.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

"Today, we look at setting a minimum price per unit for alcohol. This is a stupid idea because it immediately turns (formerly) cheap booze into a massively profitable line for the supermarkets, with no price competition to worry about. This means that they will spend tens of millions promoting it, and sales may even increase."

Depends on how the minimum price is set. If it's set by giving producers or distributors extra profit, it has the effect you outline. If it's a tax, then it doesn't.

[drplokta]

You can increase the average price with a tax, but you can't set a minimum, as it will still be possible for it to be sold well below cost as a loss-leader.

[rdmaughan.livejournal.com]

Drink Driving went away because it became socially unacceptable. Until it becomes socially unacceptable to go out and get drunk and end up in A&E the problem will continue.

Perhaps a total ban on alcohol advertising should be considered?

[evil-mogwai.livejournal.com]

They said on the news that they were considering having an alcohol advertising ban.

Interestingly in the US they see Drink Driving / DUIs like we do (slight) speeding. I've seen people spouting stuff about different alcohol tolerances, Bars being out of town, living out of town etc. They very much treat it like its the cops and "another revenue collection tactic".

Most states are as lax, or even laxer, on sentences for DUI's that we are speeding. Some people boast about 5th, 6th etc... when do you hear us boasting about our 6th speeding ticket?

And yet you get the other side of the

[ceemage.livejournal.com]

...since the government has no way to find out what cost price is.

One option, using a bit of game theory - ask the companies that sell it to tell the government what the cost price is. But the government then has the option to buy the drink at that price for re-sale to its competitors.