The Low Enjoyment Lifestyle - Scottish Style!

Dick Puddlecote has been writing some excellent stuff recently. Not least in highlighting this piece of class bullshit (aka. a "report") from Sheffield University (from the Telegraph article).

It estimates that alcohol-related hospital admissions and deaths would be reduced by 3,600 per year and there would also be 1,100 fewer criminal offences. For a 50p threshold the respective figures are 8,900 and 4,200.

The report also recognises that even though consumption might fall with minimum pricing, overall spending by consumers would go up. At the 40p threshold, consumers would be spending 3.4 per cent more on drink.

It concludes that a moderate drinker could expect to spend £11 more per year, a hazardous drinker £58 more a year and a harmful drinker £137 more.

Meanwhile, the research predicts a minimum price will also lead to 30,000 fewer absence days from work a year.

It's fairly safe to say that most "harmful drinkers" are likely to not be in work anyway (not in the private sector anyway). And if they're down to save £137 a year, how much are some of these people claiming in various incapacity allowances and whatnots? Secondly, those lighter drinkers who stand to save £11 a year are simply going to buy the supermarket's own baked beans in order to compensate. It's not a big deal. I reckon I could save £150 a year by buying Tesco Value products.

And another point that hasn't really been thought through at all, is that at least some of these people are going to have kids. So the heavy drinkers will end up spending child benefit on booze and then we'll get yet more rounds from the Righteous of "child poverty".

I am also a bit confused by the terminology too. What exactly is a "hazardous drinker"? Hazardous to whom? I can't help but think this has been worded deliberately poorly so as to confuse and alarm.

It's just another tax hike. Let's not pretend. If they were serious, they'd either make drinking illegal or bump the prices up by 500%.

Pretentious cunts!