Millennial women have closed the gender drinking gap, according to a recent study and my current pounding hangover.
The study, published today in BMJ Open [pdf], found that for decades men have been far more likely to drink heavily than women, but now millennial women born between 1991 and 2000 have all but closed that gap. The research dates back over a century—men born between 1891 and 1910 were 2.2 times as likely as women to drink, but now men and women born between 1991 and 2000 are throwing whiskey shots back at a 1:1 ratio.
This seems fun, but is also potentially deadly, since the drinking increase also corresponds with an increase in alcohol dependence and misuse. In the early 1900s, men were three times more likely to develop problems with alcohol than women; now that women are boozing with abandon just like men, they're just as likely to develop problems.
Prior research has suggested that women have more opportunities to drink when they "improve their education, employment, and status," and since more women enroll in college than men now (and make up a significant portion of the workforce) it makes sense that women spend more time in bars than at home soberly rearing babies.
It's unclear what will happen if and when younger women do start having children, and the researchers behind today's study say their findings "highlight the importance of further tracking young male and female cohorts as they age into their 30s, 40s, and beyond." So we'll see if we're all still a bunch of hot messes in a couple decades, but for now, this SNL Girls' Halloween skit speaks to truth:
