how much?

bolliwoodi

My bf stated this point to me earlier and wondering peoples opinions.......

He thinks Irish people spend more on booze than cars per year.Considering most of the people we know go out every weekend and spend on average 40-60 euro (not inc taxis/takeaways)

Its well known(or assumed) that irish people consume more alcohol than most other countires- and though the "country that drinks more on average" has changed a lot the last few years people still assume its ireland that drinks more.

Irish new car sales in 2006 grew by 4.1% for a total of 178,826 units, a rise of 7,904 cars. Considering the average NEW car price is about 25,000 euro that makes a total 4.47 billion spent on new cars in 2006.

I have TRIED to find alcohol sales in Ireland for 2006 but i cant find them on Goodle or Wikipedia, so can anyone enlighten me here?

Cos i think hes wrong-I cant believe we spend that much on drink!

feylya

Well, if a car is €25,000 and the loan is over 5 years, that's about €100 a week. He's not too far off.

brianthebard

I don't have a car, so yeah I do spend more on drink

Clarehobo

Your friends spend very little on alcohol - do they drink at home or something?;)

I don't think we do actually consume more alcohol than other nations - there were stats released there a few years ago that some Eastern European countries were miles ahead of us. It's just that we spend a lot on it.

Drink is just quite expensive here!
I wish I had a car but I can't afford it with this darned drinking habit:rolleyes:

copacetic

feylya wrote:

Well, if a car is €25,000 and the loan is over 5 years, that's about €100 a week. He's not too far off.

but then you have to add on petrol, insurance, repair, car tax etc.. assuming you are trying to calculate the ammount each individuals spends on each.

bolliwoodi

Clarehobo wrote:

Your friends spend very little on alcohol - do they drink at home or something?;)

no- well sometimes ..... iv a lOTA friends and every 4th/5th weekend theyd drink at home n invite us (+3/4) others over!

But we live down in tipperary

were do u live

cos if u live in cork/dub it might cost more????

Alessandra

I am a student with a buget of less than 120euro a week to cover food and other necessities. Of this I spend on average 50euro on going out per week, of that about 38.50 on buying drinks which doesn't buy you much I can tell you! 38.50x52=probably enough to buy me a set of wheels :eek:

Clarehobo

bolliwoodi wrote:

no- well sometimes ..... iv a lOTA friends and every 4th/5th weekend theyd drink at home n invite us (+3/4) others over!

But we live down in tipperary

were do u live

cos if u live in cork/dub it might cost more????

In Dublin at the moment so it is expensive to drink, even though I don't splurge on drink that much any more

But even when I was a student in Limerick, I still spent scary money on going out(scary as in in proportion to the total money I had to spend)

copacetic raises a really good point about running costs, especially the insurance end - it does get expensive

Just shopping for a car now: thanks bolliwoodi for motivating me, been meaning to get one for ages:)

alleepally

If you take the figure here

http://euobserver.com/851/21768

€1675 per household spent on Alcohol

and multiply that by the number of households in the state as reported here

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/numprivhseholds.htm

1,469,521

you will get a reasonable approximation - it's nowhere near the amount spent on cars but what a great little nation and what a proud statistic we have when it comes to alcohol consumption and binge drinking.

InFront

I don't drink, and only drive my parents cars (which costs nothing), so how come I'm broke
Everyone finds ways to waste money

copacetic

InFront wrote:

I don't drink, and only drive my parents cars (which costs nothing), so how come I'm broke

porn?

deisedevil

Ya, i'd say we def spend more on the booze than cars. If i think about it, if i stop drinking and spend all that money on weekly car repayments i could get a seriously decent car for that, at least half my wages goes on piss ups.
The reason i don't have a car is because of the amount i spend on drink, on the one hand i feel fairly bloody stupid about that, on the other i like my life the way it is and i don't really need a car right now, i'll get one eventually but for now i'm happy.

PeakOutput

our european friends drink roughly the same as u s when talking about units but its only because they will have a glass of wine at every meal every day wereas we cram it into firday/saturday night...thats what our problem is

if you that the average person over 18 will spend 65euro a week on booze and multply that by say 2million(a guess of the top of my head of people over 18 and under 60) thats 130million a week by 4 is 520million a month by 12 is about 6.5billion a year

i guestimated all those stats but they sound right to me

InFront

InFront wrote:

I don't drink, and only drive my parents cars (which costs nothing), so how come I'm broke
Everyone finds ways to waste money

I don't drink and I don't drive, and I'm broke too

brianthebard

PeakOutput wrote:

our european friends drink roughly the same as u s when talking about units but its only because they will have a glass of wine at every meal every day wereas we cram it into firday/saturday night...thats what our problem is

if you that the average person over 18 will spend 65euro a week on booze and multply that by say 2million(a guess of the top of my head of people over 18 and under 60) thats 130million a week by 4 is 520million a month by 12 is about 6.5billion a year

i guestimated all those stats but they sound right to me

Well it would, you made them up....if you really care about the statistics check out gov.ie I'm sure you'll be able to find some with a quick search.

PeakOutput

brianthebard wrote:

f you really care about the statistics check out gov.ie

i dont but feel free if you would like to

brianthebard

I could but then you'd never learn....

unreggd

I'm sure a lot more people drink than by cars per week

PeakOutput

unreggd wrote:

I'm sure a lot more people drink than by cars per week

and........

0utshined

More people drink than own cars so you have to factor that in too.

I'd agree with your bf. Speaking for myself, I've had times where i'd be spending far far more per week on getting wasted than on my car (loan, tax, petrol, insurance). Right now it's slightly more on the car but I know a lot of people who that wouldn't be the case for.

Caliden

We only SPEND the most on drink. Afaik those statistics don't take into account the quantity of drink consumed.

brianthebard

0utshined wrote:

More people drink than own cars so you have to factor that in too.

I'd agree with your bf. Speaking for myself, I've had times where i'd be spending far far more per week on getting wasted than on my car (loan, tax, petrol, insurance). Right now it's slightly more on the car but I know a lot of people who that wouldn't be the case for.

I find it hard to believe that people are spending more on drink than their car. Last year I was drinking fairly heavily and spent perhaps between 50 and 80-90 quid a week, more than that once or twice. Between petrol, insurance, tax, repayments and everything else spent on cars, that's still less than 90 quid??

0utshined

Believe it man. I can't see how you'd be drinking heavy and only spend €90 a week though, we must've done it wrong. If you're staying in you might be able to manage that but if you're heading out to clubs or pubs it's going to be far in excess of that.

When you're thinking of young people with no mortgage etc. the social life is all. I was talking to a guy in work last week who said he spends €120 on a night out! Start off on beers but move on to shots etc. and they cost money.

brianthebard

Yeah it mainly was drinking in, but went out once a week too. I have spent €120 on a night out, but I was buying shots for everyone.

Rb

An average new car, priced at €25K, would be about twice the price of the my nights out per year, so no, I'm certainly not spending more on drink than I would on a car.