Party like a grandpa? Sober as a student? Generations flip script on alcohol.

In case you’re a university scholar making an attempt to throw a blowout, you would possibly need to look to your grandparents for inspiration. 

Typical knowledge imagines younger folks, reveling in youthful power and newfound independence, as the toughest partiers. However Era Z and child boomers are flipping the script.

The share of individuals ages 18 to 34 who say they drink fell from 73% within the early 2000s to 59% in 2024, in response to Gallup. That’s the bottom youth-drinking charges have been this century. The drop, mixed with an 18% improve in consuming charges amongst Individuals over age 55 through the early 2000s, has introduced the 2 teams’ charges of alcohol consumption almost to parity. 

Megan Brenan, a senior editor at Gallup, says youthful folks’s declining consuming charges appear to be an everlasting pattern. “It’s been a reasonably regular fall,” she says. “[It’s] fairly placing, on condition that, you recognize, within the early 2000s, that was the group that have been the heavy drinkers.” 

Younger adults more and more shrugging at alcohol has pushed consuming charges all the way down to 58%, barely under the historic common, at the same time as alcohol consumption amongst different adults has held regular since 2010.

It’s not simply faculty college students and younger adults, both. The share of eighth, tenth, and twelfth grade college students who drink has declined precipitously previously a number of many years, in response to the College of Michigan’s Monitoring the Future survey. In the identical survey, highschool seniors’ consuming charges halved between 1975 and 2024, falling to an all-time low of 42%.

Alcohol additionally appears to be falling out of favor within the courtroom of public opinion – once more, particularly amongst youthful Individuals. In 2024, 65% of individuals ages 18 to 34 mentioned that even reasonable consuming is unhealthy for well being. That’s a 35 share level improve since 2001. Throughout all ages, a majority of Individuals say that those that drink an “common” quantity of alcohol ought to in the reduction of.

One main caveat: Though younger individuals are consuming much less, some could also be buying and selling their cocktails and beer for different substances.

Between 2013 and 2024, the share of Individuals who smoke marijuana greater than doubled, Gallup discovered. Younger adults appear essentially the most drawn to hashish, with some 23% of these ages 18 to 34 reported smoking it final yr. Moreover, 25.8% of highschool seniors mentioned they used marijuana within the 2024 Monitoring the Future survey.

Hashish use appears to be rising amongst older folks as effectively, although it stays within the single digits. Much less than 1% of individuals over 65 reported utilizing hashish in 2006. That’s grown to eight% in 2022, in response to a federal survey.

In contrast to alcohol, the general public has come to view hashish extra favorably over time. Individuals see marijuana as safer than alcohol and far safer than cigarettes, Ms. Brenan says. Final yr, 68% of Individuals mentioned they supported marijuana legalization, in contrast with solely 12% in 1969.