Belly Up to the Data Bar for Some Statistics on Drinking

A century ago, do-gooders worried that the lower classes would drink themselves into the poorhouse. Now, a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics indicates a different relationship between drink and poverty. Using data from 1997-98, the study finds poor people far less likely to drink than their better-off compatriots. Among adults with income below the poverty level, 46 percent identified themselves as current drinkers, versus 62 percent of all adults and 76 percent of those with incomes at least 400 percent above the poverty line.