Germany has a booze problem — or does it?

As Berlin debates higher alcohol taxes, the press blames cheap beer for a national crisis.

Dear Reader,

You could almost hear the astonishment in the journalist’s mouth as she typed the words into her keyboard. “Less alcohol is imbibed in Russia and the United Kingdom than here in Germany, even though the people of those countries have a reputation for uncontrolled drinking habits,” Der Spiegel noted in a recent article.

The shock runs deep. It turns out that the Brits, with their love of a Saturday-night binge, and the Russians, who allegedly sleep with a bottle of vodka under their pillow, are actually more sober than Germans.

In fact, almost everyone in Europe has brought their drinking habits under control in recent years, leaving only Romania and a few small Baltic states with worse hangovers than the Teutons.

Photo by BENCE BOROS on Unsplash

The culprit, Germany’s media unanimously agree, is the state. Figures released last month show that Germany has the cheapest alcohol prices in the entire EU except for Italy. A bottle of booze in Finland costs one and a half times what…