USA!! USA!! USA!!



  • Big international bank UBS gathered data about the median wages and average retail prices of a pint (500 ml) of beer in 150 countries.  After crunching the numbers, they have determined that the USA has the cheapest beer in the world.

     



  • Well we do have Natural Light. Not that I have or would ever even try that stuff, but it's popular among the University students in my town.



  • I'm surprised Australia is so low on that list, with our "tax everything that moves" way of government (bipartisan on that issue unfortuneately). But then we must have a high income on average. I'm also surprised Japan is so high: when I was there I was astounded how cheap alcohol was. But then they don't really drink "beer" but more sake and other rice-based wines and spirits - which are really cheap. I got a 500mL can of 8% "Strong" for around 200 yen (about $3 at the time, about $2 now). Five of those (in Ueno park during the cherry blossom festival) and I was off my face.

    The beer I usually drink is about $5 per schooner (425mL) on tap but buying in a carton (24x375mL) is about $40. So about $10.50 vs $4.40 per litre depending on how you buy it



  • Invariably, one of you European motherfuckers will say something like "Budweiser LOL" and you'll be right. 

    But a lot of really good beer is made right here in the US.  Some of it within 5 miles of my house.  Some in my basement.  If you live in a major city, I'm sure you live within 20 minutes of a microbrewery that makes great beer.  I'm sure you also live within 5 minutes of someone who homebrews.

    It's just not the most popular stuff for reasons that have more to do with money than taste.

    Something else that's interesting:

    When I got my first brew kit, it came with a booklet that said that of the price you pay for a 6 pack of beer, 1/3 of that price is for bottling/packaging, 1/3 is for distribution, and 1/3 is for marketing.  The price of the ingredients (and labor) is really negligible when you're making that much beer.  If I don't reuse bottles, it costs something like 60 cents a bottle to buy more.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @belgariontheking said:

    Invariably, one of you European motherfuckers will say something like "Budweiser LOL" and you'll be right.

    It also makes a huge difference if you're talking about the price of a case at a supermarket vs a bar or (worse) a sporting event, where you may pay more than the supermarket cost of a six pack. Of course, the chart also talks about "minutes of work to buy 500ml of beer." And the US has a relatively high median wage.

    As a wag, I'd say the average price of a six pack of beer at my local store is something like $8. So the 500ml would cost about $1.88. They estimated $1.80, so that seems reasonable. And they're saying it takes about 5 minutes at the median hourly wage, which means they used something like $21.60, which seems in the ball park.

    Australia is definitely at the top end as far as expensive beer goes ($3.70), but I guess a relatively high median wage keeps you in suds. How much of that is tax? In the US, there appears to be either a $0.05 or $0.02 federal excise tax per 12oz can, plus whatever sales taxes your local jurisdiction adds (generally somewhere from 0 - 10%).


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @boomzilla said:

    It also makes a huge difference if you're talking about the price of a case at a supermarket vs a bar or (worse) a sporting event, where you may pay more than the supermarket cost of a six pack. Of course, the chart also talks about "minutes of work to buy 500ml of beer."

    @TFA said:
    [...]at a retail outlet.
    I think that rules out bars or The Olympics. That said their UK figures ($3.05/£1.88) seem a tad more expensive than supermarkets running special offers[1], but cheaper than inner-city pubs (£3+) and the (backwards worked) median hourly wage (£8) doesn't appear too out of kilter.



    [1] Tesco's <a href="http://www.tesco.com/groceries/Product/Details/?id=268278446>2 for 1 special offer of 10x440ml cans (i.e. 20 cans) for £17 works out around 97p per 500ml.



  • There's lies, damn lies and statistics (*)

    Spain's ranking of beer/minute is assuming a retail prices of $3.05 per pint to arrive at 15 labor-minutes per pint. The supermarket accros the road sells beer for 0.38 euros per liter, which is about 1 labor-minute per pint of beer beating USA by seven laps.

    SPAIN!! SPAIN!! SPAIN!!

    (*) And then there's swiss banks.


  • @JvdL said:

    Spain
     @JvdL said:
    The supermarket accros the road sells beer for 0.38 euros per liter

    That's just because your economy collapsed overnight. I bet you're considering switching to bottle caps for currency.

     



  •  @dhromed said:

    @JvdL said:

    Spain
     @JvdL said:
    The supermarket accros the road sells beer for 0.38 euros per liter

    That's just because your economy collapsed overnight. I bet you're considering switching to bottle caps for currency.

     

     At least we're drunk, really.

     


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @JvdL said:

    The supermarket accros the road sells beer for 0.38 euros per liter, which is about 1 labor-minute per pint of beer beating USA by seven laps.

    There's gotta be something funny going on there. Well, maybe that's the cheapest they sell? What kind of beer is it, anyways? That's roughly the price of generic (store brand) soda here. I also think you've inflated the median wage in Spain a bit. Definitely more than their calculation.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @boomzilla said:

    There's gotta be something funny going on there. Well, maybe that's the cheapest they sell? What kind of beer is it, anyways? That's roughly the price of generic (store brand) soda here.
    For comparison to my calculation above with (which I seem to have omitted) was Stella which varies between 5.2% and 4% depending on where you are...:

    @PJH said:

    [1] Tesco's 2 for 1 special offer of 10x440ml cans (i.e. 20 cans) for £17 works out around 97p per 500ml.

    ...I present "Tesco's Everyday Value Lager (2%)". 28p/500ml.





    You're more likely to suffer from hyponatraemia before you even reach a drink-drive limit, let alone any form of intoxication, from that stuff.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @PJH said:

    For comparison to my calculation above with (which I seem to have omitted) was Stella which varies between 5.2% and 4% depending on where you are...:

    @PJH said:

    [1] Tesco's 2 for 1 special offer of 10x440ml cans (i.e. 20 cans) for £17 works out around 97p per 500ml.

    ...I present "Tesco's Everyday Value Lager (2%)". 28p/500ml.

    Wow. I surfed around on Save On Brew, and the best I could find were 30 packs of Keystone / Natural that come to about $0.48 per can (12oz or ~350ml). So, close. Though I think they have something more like 4% alcohol.

    They didn't have anything on Stella, but from memory, it tends to be in the $10-$13 range for a sixpack. So, something like $2.38 - $3.10 per 500ml.



  •  @boomzilla said:

    @JvdL said:
    The supermarket accros the road sells beer for 0.38 euros per liter, which is about 1 labor-minute per pint of beer beating USA by seven laps.

    There's gotta be something funny going on there. Well, maybe that's the cheapest they sell? What kind of beer is it, anyways? That's roughly the price of generic (store brand) soda here. I also think you've inflated the median wage in Spain a bit. Definitely more than their calculation.

    The brand is a blank store brand which I've never tried but makes you piss and gives you the same headache as any other beer.

    The exact calculation is:

    500 ml beer = 0.17 eurocents = 0.25 dollarcents. Median wage (according to The Economist / UBS()) = $3.05 per 15 minutes = $12.20 per hour = 9.50 euros/hr. That buys 48.75 pints of beer per hour = one pint every 1.2 minutes = 0.81 pints per minute

    Any which way you round this, it falls in the one pint per minute range. Cheers.

    () And then there's swiss banks.



  • @belgariontheking said:

    Invariably, one of you European motherfuckers will say something like "Budweiser LOL" and you'll be right.

    But a lot of really good beer is made right here in the US.

    Without disagreeing with the sentiment*, I'm pretty sure that their price comparisons were based on the cheapest stuff labelled as beer rather than the cheapest stuff to meet any criteria for good beer.

    * Except to the extent that I disagree that good beer exists. Mine's a Rioja.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @pjt33 said:

    I'm pretty sure that their price comparisons were based on the cheapest stuff labelled as beer rather than the cheapest stuff to meet any criteria for good beer.

    If you read the posts in this thread, you will notice that for at least countries where posters have first hand experience, your surety is obviously false.

    Though perhaps TRWTF is the OP concluding that the US has the cheapest beer, when the chart in TFA explicitly contradicts this (e.g., $1.40 in India vs $1.80 in the US). Those countries should just stop being so poor and they could afford beer as easily as we can.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @pjt33 said:

    I'm pretty sure that their price comparisons were based on the cheapest stuff labelled as beer
    I refer the honorable poster to my comment about "Tesco's Everyday Value Gnat's Piss™" some posts ago.



  •  Aren't you a Newky-broon drinker, PJH? Or heavy?



  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Cassidy said:

     Aren't you a Newky-broon drinker, PJH? Or heavy?
    Neither. Not that it's brewed in Newcastle any more.


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