Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

sysselmannen.no

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 163 posts

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#121

Post by croshan »

gregkerzhner wrote: post #118
alistairSH wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that the quotas are very low 24 bottles of liquor, 6 bottles of fortified wines, nearly 300 cans of beer, and unlimited wine annually is low? I'd hate to be the liver of anybody drinking that much.

Annually? Everything sounds high when you say it annually! Looking at the numbers on a smaller scale, if you don't count the unlimited wine, the monthly quota works out to be about 2.2 drinks / night - about 1.5 shouts of liquor and less than 1 light beer a night. Thats a pretty resonable amount of alcohol to consume - just slightly higher than the 14 drinks / week maximum that many health authorities recommend. How…

> How would you feel if the government regulated how much sugar or salt you can eat, how many hours of video games you can play, or maybe even forced you to exercise (400 hours / year)?

That's actually an interesting idea... Not saying I'd recommend it, but I'd be interested in how this affects a population at a large scale.

Requiring physical activity might lead to population demand for parks, more social interaction, less isolationism, less conflict. And I've had times where a hard limit on video games would've been nice. Incentivizing a society to not fall to their vices doesn't sound too bad.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#122

Post by cozzyd »

r_singh wrote: post #116
cozzyd wrote: post #114

In Kangerlussuaq (Greenland), the price of booze goes way up after 6 pm.

Interesting... how exactly does this work? Like Happy Hours? Or do shop owners also have to pay more to distributors?

I was talking about bars/restaurants. I think it's banned at shops after 6 pm completely.

Also, from what I remember, there is a weekly quota at the store at McMurdo station in Antarctica, but I think that probably has more to do with limited supply than rampant alcoholism (there is also a quota for soda and LaCroix...).

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#123

Post by [deleted] »

croshan wrote: post #121
gregkerzhner wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Annually? Everything sounds high when you say it annually! Looking at the numbers on a smaller scale, if you don't count the unlimited wine, the monthly quota works out to be about 2.2 drinks / night - about 1.5 shouts of liquor and less than 1 light beer a night. Thats a pretty resonable amount of alcohol to consume - just slightly higher than the 14 drinks / week maximum that many health authorities recommend. How…

> How would you feel if the government regulated how much sugar or salt you can eat, how many hours of video games you can play, or maybe even forced you to exercise (400 hours / year)? That's actually an interesting idea... Not saying I'd recommend it, but I'd be interested in how this affects a population at a large scale. Requiring physical activity might lead to population demand for parks, more social interactio…

[deleted]

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#124

Post by hardtke »

mortenjorck wrote: post #111

For a sense of scale, the Svalbard archipelago has a population of about 3,000. Antarctica's seasonal peak is around 5,000.

When I was in McMurdo station in Antarctica on the way to the South Pole I happened to be there at the same time as the Navy cargo unloading crew. McMurdo banned all alcohol sales while the Navy was in town.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#125

Post by [deleted] »

nso wrote: post #117
zwaps wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, almost all "plain" European beers have either 5% or 4,9% of alcohol (Pilsners, Lagers etc.) It seems this may also be a measure to boost local sales?

You don't know a lot about Norwegian politics on this subject if you'd even suggest that. In short it's a way for the government to limit and control the damages associated with alcohol consumption. While this would probably rub the average american the wrong way, most norwegians, including myself, approve of the system. Other posters have given more detail but here is some reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinm…

[deleted]

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#127

Post by throwaway98797 »

byproxy wrote: post #120
AdrianB1 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brain needs challenges and stimulation to develop; when people are taken care of, average IQ of society decreased over time. If you check the numbers there are several metrics where we regressed in the past hundreds of years, including reaction time, testosterones production, fertility etc. Good times create mediocre people and the times were better and better in the past centuries, while people got more and more med…

What’s wrong with being mediocre?

we must move forward, not backward; upward, not forward; and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom!

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#128

Post by spurgu »

pmiller2 wrote: post #63
Quarrelsome wrote: post #32

Anyone know the reasoning? I'm assuming its attempting to prevent alcoholism? I know Greenland and Iceland (to a lesser extent) suffer somewhat perhaps due to the light and isolation being contributing factors.

Some of the hardest drinkers I know are Finns. I'm not sure exactly why that would be, i.e. why Finns might drink more than Norwegians or Swedes, but this has been my observation. Keep in mind, n=low (I'd have to think about it, and I don't want to expend the brainpower right now).

Finn here, can confirm. My username even reflects it.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#129

Post by SOLAR_FIELDS »

Kiro wrote: post #115
qwerty456127 wrote: post #27

> Private individuals resident in Svalbard must purchase their alcohol quota in Svalbard and are not able to import tax-free alcohol from the mainland to Svalbard. I doubt local shops have particularly good assortment to choose from, do they?

In Sweden the monopoly shops have a really good assortment since they have no profit interest and can afford to provide shelf space for less popular beverages.

For the same reason they also are one of the better places in the EU to buy rare and expensive items (particularly wine due to lower taxes, but liquor as well) because they have country-wide buying power and the markup that the monopoly takes is a flat rate mandated by law. Example: https://www.thelocal.se/20181012/systembolaget-sells-rare-wh...

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#130

Post by chrissnell »

giantg2 wrote: post #53
abujazar wrote: post #47

Norwegian here. The reason for the quotas is historical and were put in place to limit miners' consumption of beer and liquor. Interestingly there's practically no quota on wine, presumably because miners didn't care much for that. You can't buy wine and liquor at local stores in Norway Svalbard, but there is a great selection in the state run monopoly stores (Vinmonopolet). In Longyearbyen there's one called Nordpol…

Pennsylvania has monopoly state stores for liquor too. When weddings used to last for days, the mine bosses here would go to the beer and liquor stores and tell them to stop selling to that group of people. Then when the drinks ran out, the wedding would end and the miners would go back to work.

More recently, the PA state-run liquor stores shut down for weeks during the covid scare and when they did open up, they only took a very limited number of orders online and over the phone. It was basically impossible to buy hard alcohol here for over a month. People were driving to other states to get it.
Post reply on HN