Data Point: Kids Way More Sensible These Days
When I was a child, society held the assumption that each new generation of kids was more dangerous, criminal, pregnant, and addled than the last, prima facie evidence of the collapse of civilization. Society still believes in the collapse of civilization, and they often still attempt to scapegoat the kids these days. But whatever other crimes you wish to accuse them them, “more drunken” ain’t right.
This morning I happened across that graph you see at the top of the post. Created by political science professor Ryan Burge, it tracks alcohol and tobacco use by U.S. teens over the past half-century. In 1976, the first dot on the graph, 92% of high school seniors had consumed alcohol “beyond a few sips” (!).* Today the figure sits at 53%, still highish, though it’s down 42%. (Tobacco use has declined even more sharply, down 59 percentage points, or 78%.) The kids may be up to no good, but they’re not sitting in the parking lot on the hood of their Mustangs with a Bud and a Marlboro like they were in the 70s anymore.
These are excellent trends. While many parents can probably accept a little teenage experimentation, they want their kids healthy and safe. The smoking figure in particular is quite heartening, because 90% of future smokers started before they were 18. (I tip my hand here, and indeed, I think cigarettes are terrible—sorry to my smoking readers! As to the question of vaping, I’ll leave that to other bloggers to tackle.) In general, Americans seem to be finding moderation in their habits, and it may be connected to their behavior as young people.
Drinking is a complex issue, and the studies I’ve seen suggest a similar correlation between early and lifelong use: get young people interested in booze, and they’ll be drinkers for life. Indeed, many brewers gaze out on their taproom clientele, see an increasingly graying crowd, and fret. I would, too. Alcohol consumption peaked around the late 1970s, but beer consumption continued to rise until 1980, staying roughly at a plateau for the next decade before beginning a decades-long decline. This is almost certainly because those high schoolers in the 70s developed a taste for beer and continued drinking.
Young people have more free time, fewer life complications, and are more socially motivated to hang out with each other. If they don’t develop the habit of going to bars when they might actually be drinking more, when will they? And, given that I think spending time with friends in pubs is one of the very best ways to spend your time, I agree. But here comes that big “on the other hand”: it’s better if they hold off developing a relationship with alcohol until their brains are less plastic and more able to handle it.
High schoolers are going to flirt with danger. It is part of growth and maturity. But it’s good if they do it in ways that are less likely to have massive, life-changing consequences. More of them skipping the booze until they’re well out of high school? Awesome.
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* It’s worth noting that other sources find a less significant decline, though the wording of the polls are not identical.