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| Are your vices foiling your finances? |
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Gregory Bloss, public health analyst for the National
Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in Rockville, Md.,
says that while one or two drinks may not kill you, the amounts
consumed by over-drinkers cost society as a whole in the neighborhood
of $185 billion annually. In addition to traffic injuries and other
accidents, alcohol abuse is statistically tied to a host of major
diseases, including cirrhosis of the liver, diabetes mellitus, hypertension,
pancreatitis, alcoholic cardiomyopathy and a host of cancers.
Bloss says the true costs of prolonged and excessive
alcohol use can more accurately be measured in non-physiological
ways. For instance, alcohol-dependent individuals who took their
first drink by age 15 earn roughly 13.1 percent less than their
peers. And given the recent federal mandate lowering the blood alcohol
level for driving while intoxicated from 0.1 to 0.08, they have
an increased risk of receiving a costly DUI and having their insurance
premiums skyrocket.
Speaking of insurance, though it's not generally known,
insurers in all but four states (as of 2004) can include a provision
in your policy that exempts them from paying for damages or losses
you sustained while intoxicated. Though this escape clause in the
Uniform
Accident and Sickness Policy Provision Law (or UPPL) is most
often included in health-care coverage, some jurisdictions allow
it in accident, long-term care and disability policies, too.
"For the majority of people who say they drink,
probably the most direct economic effect would just be the expenditure
on beverages," Bloss says. "But for the smaller portion
of people who drink heavily, either on a consistent or episodic
basis, there are substantial potential additional costs they might
avoid by not drinking."
Based on our three-city survey, Bankrate found that
a domestic bottle of beer plus tip on average will run you $4, while
a call drink (lowest price name brands) will run you $6 a pop. If
you have two beers or drinks each day, here's your bar tab:
Weekly: $56 for beer; $84 for call drinks
Monthly: $240 beer, $360 for call drinks
Annually: $2,920 beer; $4,380 for call drinks
If you're a two-beers-a-day guy and go on the wagon,
the money you would save could pay for books and a full year's tuition
at a public community college, which averages $2,076 according to
the American
Association of Community Colleges. If you prefer mixed drinks,
you can cut your daily consumption in half and still afford a year's
tuition. Eliminate both post-work highballs and you can spring for
a big-screen TV as well.
If you were to put your bar tab into a tax-free 529
college savings plan earning 7 percent for your newborn, by
the time she's ready for college you would have accumulated $99,277
(beer drinker) or $148,916 (call drinks), before taxes.
Cigarettes: Big bucks up in smoke
By now, no rational human would put a cigarette between his lips,
so comprehensive are the health arguments against it. Among our
three vices, Dr. Kava says, "The biggest threat is going to
be smoking, without a doubt."
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