Cheers to your wealth.
Binge drinking might not be the recipe for failure that it’s portrayed as in popular media. Recent studies have shown that heavy boozing during one’s youth could improve one’s chances of success later in life.
In his new book “The Beauty and Pain of Drugs,” Norwegian sociologist Willy Pedersen of the University of Oslo argues that communal drinking when young could help ease inhibitions by acting as a social lubricant, the Times of London reported.
In turn, this helps advance the liquor-loving’s careers faster than those of their socially reticent sober counterparts.
“The most likely explanation is that all alcohol is a kind of marker of sociality and that habit comes with some types of benefits,” he told the outlet. The theory is similar to the 2020 Danish film “Another Round” in which four high school teachers make a pact to maintain a certain blood-alcohol level at all times based on a theory that being perennially inebriated can improve one’s life.
To prove that liquor can help grease the wheel of fortune, the professor and his colleagues spent 18 years monitoring the drinking habits of more than 3,000 Norwegians from the age of 13 to 31.
They found that those who started hitting the sauce hard in their late teens and early twenties boasted higher levels of education and income than those who practiced abstinence or minimal boozing.
“There is a correlation,” Pedersen declared. “The statistical findings are quite strong, so clearly significant.”
To illustrate his point, Pedersen invoked Oxford University’s Bullingdon Club, an all-male drinking organization known for its uber-successful alumni, including former UK prime ministers David Cameron and Boris Johnson.
It would appear as if mainlining libations during one’s formative years can make one’s career age like fine wine.
Of course, as the Times of London observed, this correlation could be attributed — not to drinking– but rather that many members of said boozy brotherhood might already be on third base.
Young people who are fast-tracked to success are more willing and able to go heavy on the grog, especially in Norway, where a pint is extortionately expensive due to high taxes.
And while social drinking might be associated with greater success down the road, there’s no evidence that the same holds true for those who imbibe alone, Pederson warns.
Meanwhile, Linda Granlund, the director of public health at the Norwegian government’s directorate of health, who was not involved in the research, said that consuming even small amounts of hooch — either solo or socially — could negatively impact people’s health.
In accordance, she recommended that both heavy and light drinkers scale back their alcohol intake.
“Lower intake means higher life expectancy and lower risk of illness,” she declared. “Every glass you choose to skip is good for your health.”
Unfortunately, the trend appears to be going in the opposite direction.
Studies have shown that members of Generation Z, which have historically been labeled a fairly abstinent generation, are increasing their alcohol consumption as cost of living pressures ease.
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