Minimum Alcohol pricing

So Scotland has just finally put in to law its minimum alcohol pricing policy that its been trying to enact for years. The idea is to make the cheap supermarket alcohol more expensive so that the problem drinkers who binge on the stuff can't afford to anymore.

It sounds like a good plan especially when you read the stats of health problems and arrests of mainly young people who get tanked up on the cheap stuff at home. But its not popular with many obviously.

Some prices will go up a little but a few others will be going up a lot.

I know some of you don't drink but if you were a drinker would this make you stop. Or at least cut back.

This idea is for the right reasons, but there are several problems. Firstly alcoholics wont care about the price; if they want a drink they'll get it. It'll just eat away at their bank account quicker and put them on the streets quicker. And then if people run out of money but desperately need a drink it might encourage crime or violence in an effort to get one.

Overall though it's the better option. Here in Aus you can buy award-winning bottles of wine for $5 at Aldi. It's just ridiculous. Good ridiculous if you want cheap wine for a celebration, but it's just insanely cheap. Cigarette's are probably $60 for a decent pack (12 times the price of the wine), but it's arguable that alcohol is worse for you. Cigarette's don't make you intoxicated or violent.

12 bottles (big ones) of wine vs a pack of smokes. Ridiculous.

Man, Cigarettes cost 5 bucks a pack here. A bottle of wine in public markets is never seen under 20$, at least for the cheap ones. This is from my Experience in the US btw

I've never seen any alcoholic drink here under $10 on sale. Also cigarettes here are more expensive harder to buy, require a license to sell (iirc) and need to be kept in a case that you can't see into

Why so much security? Sadly, here in the u.S., all you need is an ID and need to be over 21, and you can buy as much as you want.

Here all you need is ID proving you're 18 and some money. There's no restrictions, it' just expensive.

Well here as well you need a license to buy a gun, again require stores to have them licensed and locked in some sort of way so nobody can take them. The only shops that sell guns around me have them chained and padlocked and have one of those metal divider things over the windows and doors.

Wait wut? When did we start talking about guns?

?

We were discussing what you need to buy things.

Your country requires you to have a gun to buy stuff? weird...

No, you NEED a licence to BUY a gun. Not you NEED a gun to BUY a [something].



Spoiler:

Oh Moh, that was awesome.

Thank you, I pride myself on doing things like that.

You've fit in perfectly with us misfits.

Take that as a compliment.

Beer here can be cheaper than bottled water and wine you can get for a euro a bottle but yet I would say that there is more a problem with drugs here than alcohol.

Frankly I dont think it has anything to do with price, its how you present it to your children growing up. I think you just need to show a healthy and responsible approach when they get to their teens. A small glass of wine with a healthy dinner to show that its basically something to accompany food not to binge in a field with your mates. My parents were bad examples and I saw my mother hammered many a time. You need to show that its not demon juice nor is it something to binge on on a friday and saturday night and maybe just maybe they wont feel the need to experiment, hide and go overboard.