Boozy Canucks, updated

If you read the post earlier today, you may have missed the rather extended comment Jon left to clarify the original message:

Duh! I should have tried hunting down the original report. Here it is at the StatsCan weebsite.

This note from the report is interesting, and probably invalidates all of the second-guessing I did the other day:

Note to readers

Statistics on sales of alcoholic beverages by volume should not be equated with data on consumption. Sales volumes include only sales by liquor authorities and their agents, and sales by wineries and breweries and outlets that operate under license from the liquor authorities.

Consumption of alcoholic beverages would include all these sales, plus homemade wine and beer, wine and beer manufactured through brew-on-premises operations, all sales in duty-free shops and any unrecorded transactions.

Similarly, statistics on sales of alcoholic beverages by dollar value of sales should not be equated with consumer expenditures on alcoholic beverages. The sales data refer to the revenues received by liquor authorities, wineries and breweries and these revenues include sales to licensed establishments such as bars and restaurants.

The sales data, therefore, do not reflect the total amount spent by consumers on alcoholic beverages since the prices paid in licensed establishments are greater than the price paid by those establishments to the liquor authorities.

Per capita data are based on the population aged 15 and over.

"The sales data, therefore, do not reflect the total amount spent by consumers on alcoholic beverages." Hmm. You sure don't get that impression from the way the Toronto Daily Socialist reported it.

And, to add even more information to the mix, here is some information from the Reason Foundation, on some surprising correlations between drinking and money:

Numerous studies have shown moderate alcohol use can have important health benefits and now a new report finds drinking can help your wallet too.

Drinkers earn 10 to 14 percent more money at their jobs than nondrinkers and men who drink socially, visiting a bar at least once a month, bring home an additional 7 percent in pay, according to a new Reason Foundation report by economists Bethany Peters, Ph.D., and Edward Stringham, Ph.D.

"Social drinking builds social capital," said Stringham, an economics professor at San Jose State University. "Social drinkers are networking, building relationships, and adding contacts to their Blackberries that result in bigger paychecks."

The study finds that men who drink earn 10 percent more than abstainers and women drinkers earn 14 percent more than nondrinkers. However, unlike men, who get an additional income boost from drinking in bars, women who frequent bars at least once per month do not show higher earnings than women who do not visit bars.

Well, I'll drink to that!