r/Futurology • u/roystreetcoffee • 2h ago
Society Is the future of alcohol consumption & number of bars/pubs as bleak as predicted? If people are socializing less in bars (& clubs & churches & malls), is that necessarily a bad thing?
Recent news headlines related to alcohol consumption decline:
"Total US beer production dropped from 158.1 million barrels to 148.3 million barrels — the lowest in the past decade. Beer production began declining in 2022 and has continued to fall since then."
"Wine sales in the US have dipped more than 20% over the past five years."
"The French drink half as much wine as they did in the 1970s. In Britain, consumption per person has fallen 14% since 2000."
"There were 37,350 pubs and bars in the UK in March 2026, down from 44,680 in 2010."
"Older Men are Top Beer Drinkers in Japan."
"The number of bars and clubs in the United States has fallen by over 60% per capita since the late 1970s."
28
u/Dry_Bag8911 2h ago
alcohol might physically be bad for one's health, and many people have issues with alcoholism, but I don't think this completely wipes out the benefits of alcohol consumption. Alcohol reduces social inhibitions, making it easier to make new friends, deepen bonds with old friends and is a huge part of how people couple up. I met many of my close friends while drinking and certainly got to know them better while drinking. A pub or bar is also a much better place to get drunk than by drinking super market-bought alcohol since the bartender could cut you off and kick you out.
In the UK, at least in the past, community was formed IN the pub - it was a third space where everyone was welcome, where people from different professions and social classes could mix and bond. A lot has changed in the past 20 years, but the destruction of the local pub is in my view a large factor in why people in the UK feel more isolated and less connected than they did in the past.
Having close social connections is strongly correlated with life longevity, so it arguably even has physical health benefits too.
•
u/5050Clown 1h ago
You can say the same thing for smoking. It definitely drove conversation when I was younger. All of my friends, I got closer to them through smoking, smoke breaks at work, smoke breaks at school, just stepping outside to have a smoke.
I'm still very glad people aren't smoking anymore.
44
u/DefendTheStar88x 2h ago
Id say people socializing less is a bad thing. But one shouldn't need booze to do so.
•
u/Darryl_Lict 1h ago
You shouldn't, but alcohol is a social lubricant which makes people more loquacious and bars are the perfect place to strike up a conversation with a stranger. I'm old and any time I'm hanging out in a new city, I'll stop at a dive bar and attempt to strike up a conversation.
•
u/hoptownky 34m ago
I probably would have never gotten laid or married if it weren’t for alcohol. I had horrible anxiety and was terrified of talking to girls. Give me a few drinks in a bar and I am cracking jokes and laid back.
I like to think I am over the anxiety now. But if I had to go on a date with someone I met on an app like kids do today, I would probably try to meet in a bar and show up early and have a few.
•
u/seraph321 40m ago
Maybe they shouldn't NEED to, but it's fun, and there seems to be an increasing emphasis on calling out everything that's bad about everything that might be fun. There's a reason humans have had a close relationship with alcohol for thousands of years.
5
33
u/Stereo_Jungle_Child 2h ago
The problem is that without a viable and popular "third space" like a bar/pub for people to gather to speak to other actual humans in person, people will lose the ability to talk to each other in person.
Look at young people already today. Voice phone calls are already off the table; they don't want to do those. Then, even when you manage to get some of them in the same room with each other, they're all looking at their phones the whole time. They can't stand to and don't know how to do simple things like make small talk with a stranger at a bus stop for two minutes.
These are important human interpersonal skills to acquire that you aren't going to learn on TikTok.
7
u/roystreetcoffee 2h ago
I agree with the "third space" necessity and the importance of developing interpersonal skills.
i disagree with the voice calls. Just 25 years ago, most people did not have cell phones. I hate getting calls to my cell phone or hearing rings every single day in public spaces! So annoying.
5
u/88cowboy 2h ago
You had me until 2 minute small talk at the bus stop. 16 year old me wouldn't want to small talk with some old man waiting on the bus.
8
-2
u/BadBoyDad 2h ago
So weird to not want to talk to someone because of their age. Don’t you want to learn about another person’s life no matter how small that window might be? What has happened to youthful curiosity? I loved hearing from people older than me when I was a teen. I had so much to learn from them.
11
5
u/GrizzlyP33 2h ago
I’m too old to know what young 20 something’s are actually doing, but I do know I do a lot of work for alcohol brands and they are freaking out about young people not drinking anymore.
7
u/salsanacho 2h ago
Beers are 9 or 10 dollars a pint around me, these fancy mixed cocktails are 15 to 17 bucks. I've got zero interest in paying that much for a drink when I can buy a 24 pack of craft brews from costco for 35 bucks.
Along the younger generations, I also think there's less glorification of getting wasted. Seems to be less focus on that being the cool thing to do nowadays.
5
u/DustScoundrel 2h ago
I think it's slightly more complicated than simply us being increasingly isolated and socially disconnected, but I do think the source is the same. Neoliberalism drives hyperindividuality and economic precarity, both of which make a healthy social life challenging.
However, it also drives the consolidation and homogenization of the market - including that of nightlife. Look in your area - it doesn't matter where - and consider the number of bars that are a chain or equity-owned. Part of what makes a place feel good to go to is that it can be community: It's your local, it has life to it, people play music at it. Now we have "X thing" social or sterile venues that overcharge.
•
u/seraph321 37m ago
To some extent, we may just be seeing how much bars were people's default because they didn't have something else that tended to capture their attention. Now that we have nearly unlimited 'entertainment' in our pockets at all times, that desire for novelty and distraction from the mundane is less prominent.
Combine that, of course, with things like health concerns and affordability.
5
u/wildlifa 2h ago
People are just poor to buy unnecessary/optional stuff. New hobbies involve activities that don't require money. Such as watching birds...
•
u/142638503846383038 1h ago
Seems like trouble that poor people can’t even afford to drink anymore… at least throughout history they had that. Now you have to do meth or fent if you’re poor and want to take the edge off
•
u/Renax127 1h ago
Yeah its a bit of a problem. We re losing third spaces in general and every time a place here people socialize closes we lose little bit of community spirit
•
u/Bigsmalltallall 1h ago
People don't go out as much anymore. Bars close. Some restaurants. Clubs. Etc. These are "generally" small businesses that pump money right back into the local economy. Also, its a tell that people aren't going out anymore which is not a good thing. We are social creatures after all.
•
u/1911Earthling 1h ago
Can’t drink and drive! Plain and simple for most folks.
•
u/roystreetcoffee 42m ago
There was no Uber or Lyft in most cities just 15 years ago.
At my local dive bars, they call Uber all the time for drunks.
•
u/1911Earthling 40m ago
Drinking is not worth putting my half aware ass in a strangers car for a ride home. Just not worth the risk.
•
•
u/kichwas 59m ago
Alcohol is bad, but the human socialization in person and untracked so people feel free to make mistakes is vital for community and forming intimacy.
The less of it you have, the more alienated people get from each other and the less couples get together.
The ability to be stupidly uninhibited is a vital part of humanity…
•
u/Procrasturbating 35m ago
Feel bad for the music scene too. Most of the shows I’ve seen this year had me and the other bands playing that night as a crowd. It was not always like this.
5
u/Honest_Ad_1733 2h ago
Beer is the best invention in the history of humanity.
•
u/trouthunter8 1h ago
"Alcohol is the source of and solution to all of life's problems." Homer Simpson.
5
u/Absentmindedgenius 2h ago
Draft beer used to be a lot cheaper. I remember the headlines blamed it on hops prices.
3
u/tuppenycrane 2h ago
Is it a bad thing?? Gen Z is the loneliest generation with the least romantic success at for their age. Young people are increasingly at the mercy of algorithms both in terms of forming their political beliefs as well as their dating prospects.
You know what the best way to deradicalise a terminally online person is? Have them actually go outside and talk to real people, people outside their bubble. Do you know how much harder it is to be convinced to hate a group of people when you know some of them?
I’d much rather everyone was drinking 10x more if it meant they scrolled 10x less (and were drinking with other people). Whatever issues alcohol causes doesn’t compare to the damage social media does to our society every day lol, and if you don’t agree with that you seriously need to wake up.
•
u/Bscully973 1h ago
Or maybe people are realizing how terrible alcohol is for your health. It's quite literally a carcinogen.
•
u/Boatster_McBoat 1h ago
3rd spaces are important. Less toxins, and less alcohol-fueled violence is a good thing but less social interaction is not
4
u/Hot_Individual5081 2h ago
i see this as a huge positive tbh also id like to see the complete destruction of tobacco indistry
2
u/roystreetcoffee 2h ago
Submission Statement:
All signs point towards a major prolonged decline in alcohol consumption in the US, Western Europe, Japan and much of the developed world.
The number of bars is the western world has also declined substantially over the decades.
Meanwhile, sales of non-alcoholic beer and wine have ballooned.
Are we looking at a future with even up to 50% less per capita alcohol consumption? And far less socialization in bars and nightclubs?
•
u/Psych_Yer_Out 1h ago
We need a new 3rd space, arcades/malls/bookstore,coffee shop filled those in the past
3
u/meridian_smith 2h ago
Why would you described declining alcoholism as bleak?
5
u/roystreetcoffee 2h ago
If someone drinks 3 drinks at a bar, twice a week, I generally see that as a positive. I know a couple of 80 plus year olds at my local bar who do that, and they love the social aspect.
Actual "alcoholism" is terrible, but people have different definitions of at what point this word applies.
•
u/ArchaicBrainWorms 1h ago
I spent a few years tending bar in rural Appalachia 20+ years ago and those were my favorite regulars. They'd come in or married couple would meet there after work, have a few drinks and a nice meal over the course of 2-3 hours. Probably skirting the legal limit to drive but nobody was significantly impaired.
I'm not a teetotler but I rarely drink and I don't ever risk a DUI at this stage of my life
•
u/Moldy_slug 1h ago
Most people who drink aren’t alcoholics. But most of the alcohol bought is drunk by alcoholics.
Over half of alcohol in the US is consumed by the top 10% heaviest drinkers. This is a group that averages 10 drinks per day. No matter what definition you use, that’s an extremely unhealthy amount of drinking.
If the top decile somehow could be induced to curb their consumption level to that of the next lower group (the ninth decile), then total ethanol sales would fall by 60 percent.
So I highly doubt we’d see significant reduction in alcohol sales without also reducing the number of very heavy drinkers.
•
u/Wosota 1h ago
The vast majority of people drinking 10+ a day are not doing that all at a bar.
Even when beer and liquor was cheaper that was cost prohibitive.
•
u/Moldy_slug 39m ago
Of course. But most of the statistics OP referenced are about total volume of alcohol sales, not attendance at bars/pubs.
The one that did look at pubs was comparing 2010 to 2026… which fails to consider the effect of Covid. Of the roughly 7000 pubs and bars that closed, how many did so during or shortly after the pandemic? That was a huge blow to the entire food/hospitality sector. It’s only been a few years since lockdown ended, which is not much time to re-establish an industry that was so badly affected.
1
•
u/tofast05 1h ago
I’m old (late fifties) I drink at most social occasions and will have a glass of wine or two with my wife regularly but not constantly. If I’m by myself I rarely drink at all. Genuine question do people tend to drink less on their own and even if engaged online ?
•
u/Lunar_Landing_Hoax 1h ago
Alcohol is not good for you, there's no doubt about it, but this is a bad thing. There were studies that show people that drink a little live longer than people that don't drink at all, but it's because of their social connection, not because they drink. In other words, the type of person that has a couple of drinks is a social person, and social people literally live longer than isolated person. So there is some nuance here. Yes people should not drink so much, but the loss of third spaces and community and casual chats with strangers is the real underlying problem.
•
u/catgotcha 15m ago
I think the aging baby boomer population may be one factor. When people get older they drink less.
•
u/ShoelessBoJackson 9m ago
Prob not as bleak, but alcohol has downward pressure.
Less young people. Hard to sell as much when your customer is aging and not being replaced.
Health consequences are well known AND combine with the unhealthy modern processed diet. People are unhealthy, and cutting alcohol is a start.
Social distain and consequences. Drinking and driving has far more consequences than for parents generation. Plus, being a heavy drinker is less tolerated. "Bob goes to the bar on Tues and Thurs? Ew. Asshole shows up late, is worthless till noon and makes his wife do everything.
Less available. Costs are bars is up. Cost to get to and from bar is up. If you can't walk 10 minutes to a bar, your prob need to take transit or drive (see #3).
Other distractions. Other drugs, social media, dating apps. Why go to bars to try to find a date when I can go on tinder and try my luck?
1
u/Eazy12345678 2h ago
people are dumb. there will always be people drinking poison to feel good.
look at history. chewing tabacco, cigs, then vapes, then zyns, ect
just wait for the next hot thing
1
u/Sun-Anvil 2h ago
I haven't been to an actual bar in a long time but breweries, that's a separate issue. I like sitting outside with friends having a nice pint. As for winter (as long as it's not blistering cold) said breweries will seal off the outside seating with heaters and we carry on. All that said I'm older so my timeline is different than what this article is about.
0
0
u/taiwanluthiers 2h ago
I don't drink alcohol and it makes me sick. However bars are a bit expensive, and I've noticed only the well to do go there. But if wages are low and people are struggling to make ends meet they won't go there.
Social media doesn't help... and what's worse is when it comes to online dating half are scammers, and the other half is shallow.
0
u/Heywtfhey 2h ago
I hope in the future there is less alcohol and more public socialising. Not sure what that looks like.
•
u/Euphoric_Trifle_9235 1h ago
Less alcohol consumption seems like a no-brainer awesome thing. But I do worry about the lack of social interaction. Learning to navigate your way through awkward or tough social situations seems like a challenge that is much less frequent for some young people these days. I'm in my forties and I work with a bunch of young folk between 16 and 25. They are amazing kids, so kind and thoughtful in so many ways, but their inability to navigate social interactions, or to even try, is a bit alarming to me.
224
u/NarrowContribution87 2h ago
Yes. Not because the bars etc are sacred, but because it’s a sign that we’re increasingly disconnected and antisocial.