Empirical Regularities in Cross-Country Alcohol Consumption*

This paper analyses the demand for the three beverages: beer, wine and spirits, within alcohol, at a cross-country level for 10 countries: Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the UK and the US. A number of empirical regularities were found at the cross-country level. This includes: (i) the demand theory hypotheses, homogeneity and symmetry are generally acceptable; (ii) the additive utility hypothesis is also acceptable even for such narrowly defined commodities; (iii) in nine out of the 10 countries, beer is considered as a necessity, in half of the countries wine is a necessity and in all the countries spirits are a luxury; and (iv)in all the countries, the demand for beer, wine and spirits are price inelastic.