While younger generations are drinking less, adults aged 50 to 64 are drinking more, causing a shift reshaping the US bar scene
Alcohol consumption has decreased across the United States in recent years, particularly among adults under age 40, but there is one older demographic in which more people are drinking than before the Covid-19 pandemic – and more are doing so heavily, according to a new study.
For the first time since before the pandemic, the percentage of US adults who drink any alcohol decreased between 2022 and 2024, according to the report in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine. People from 50 to 64, which roughly corresponds with gen X, were the only age group in which drinking continued to increase.
They are likely hurting their health by imbibing, according to the latest science, but they are also helping keep open bars. Such businesses have struggled as younger generations, the drivers of nightlife, move away from booze.
Your generation is as much about your cohort and where you were born as it is when you are born. Growing up with GenX siblings, especially if you grew up not on the coasts, would put you in the running for being GenX rather than a millennial.
For instance somebody born in 1995 who grew up in San Francisco would be closer to GenZ than somebody who was born in 1998 and grew up in rural Texas. There is always a transition gradient.