The end of Heineken Man

Drinking cheap beer in the name of austerity. That's just crazy talk! I'd rather have one good beer than 6 industrial brews, so the good stuff is cheaper, anyway.

Guess what? It's possible to give up beer altogether, and enter the austerity of your grandparents' era. Some of us are going to.

Frank Booth: What kind of beer do you like to drink, neighbor?
Jeffrey Beaumont: Heineken.
Frank Booth: Heineken? F*ck that sh*t! Pabst Blue Ribbon!

MI -

Don't know if this helps, but I suspect she picked 1945 - the final year of WWII rationing programs - for a reason. Energy started becoming more available in 1946, just as it had been available before the war. My guess is that if she had picked 1925 or (as you did) 1950, she would not have found a big gap between domestic energy use then and energy use now.

Rod -

Great article. Obviously the NYT is crazy. But so, I'm afraid, is Sharon Astyk. She assumes as a first principle that our lives are unsustainable and that a reckoning is nigh. She provides no basis for this first principle; it's as much a part of her universe as the sun or the trees. Crazy.

Joe Magarac - Redoing the above post with slightly better stats:

# of households:

1940: 34,949,000 (*)
1945: 37,919,000 (*)
2006: 114,384,000 (**)

Total US energy consumption:

1940: 25.205 quads (***)
1945: 32.665 quads (***)
2006: 99.586 quads (****)

Per-household energy consumption (calculated from above):

1940: 721E6 Btus
1950: 861E6 Btus
2000: 871E6 Btus

More interesting, perhaps, would be energy intensity & per-capita consumption for 1945 & today. Absent boredom, I leave chasing down such stats as an exercise for the reader.

Aside: My SWAG is that WWII energy rationing wasn't aimed so much at curbing overall US energy consumption, as at curbing _civilian_ energy consumption.

(*) US Census Bureau, "Historical Statistics of the United States", Chapter A, p. 41, Series A 288-319. 1945 stat interpolated from 1940 & 1947 stats.

(**) 2008 Statistical Abstract, Table 58.

(***) EIA, 2008 Annual Energy Review, Table E1, at eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb1701.html

(****) EIA, 2008 Annual Energy Review, Table 1.1

Being a Guinness fan, this is my favorite beer joke:

The biggest beer producers in the world meet for a conference, and at the end of the day, the presidents of all the beer companies decide to have a drink together at a bar.

The president of Budweiser naturally orders a Bud, the president of Miller orders a Miller, Adolph Coors orders a Coors, and so on down the list.

Then the bartender asks Arthur Guinness what he wants to drink, and to everybody's amazement, he orders tea!

"Why don't you order a Guinness?" his colleagues ask suspiciously, wondering if they've stumbled on an embarrassing secret.

"Naaaah," replies Guinness. "If you guys aren't going to drink beer, then neither will I."

Great joke.

Guys, I thought I was clear that Heineken is a metaphor here. I too would rather not drink beer than drink cheap, tasteless beer. Nor, Daniel, do I feel "guilty" over having relatively expensive tastes in beer, etc. My point is that I have never had to worry where my next Heineken (speaking metaphorically) is coming from. I've never been able to afford, say, a ski vacation, but my life is full of those little luxuries, which I've been blessed enough in my life never to have to worry about paying for.

Looking at my bank accounts now, though, in the face of what's about to hit us, I wish I had been less willing to throw myself into those small indulgences, and more thoughtful about saving along the way. I've always been the kind of guy who will decide on the way home, "You know, it'd be great to have a bottle of wine with dinner tonight," and who will stop off at the wine store to pick up one. Or two. I can't be that guy anymore.

My father certainly wouldn't want me to have the life of hardship that he had growing up. But I do remember all throughout my childhood him telling me to pay attention when he was trying to show me how to do different handyman things around the house, telling me that I would save a lot of money some day if I knew how to do these things, and didn't have to pay someone else to do it. I paid absolutely no attention; had my head in a book all the time. I wish I had done it differently now. Dad is college educated (the first in his family to go to college), but when he dies, a lot of practical knowledge that was once available to me will die with him. It's my loss, and it's my fault.

We're several generations out from being able to fix our own toilet on my side of the family, so when I was first with my husband and he wanted to do things like change the oil on his car himself and drain the evaporative cooler, I just didn't get it. Of course, what didn't help was that we were both working and finding the time to get on the roof was hard to do. So I said, let's just hire someone. A few years later when his dad offered to help build a shed I was a little less skeptical, since the plastic and metal sheds we had bought were pretty different from the wood shed with a concrete floor and rafters that they put together in just a few days. Now I'm stockpiling books on plumbing and really want to learn enough somehow to teach my kids, and I just don't know if I can ever catch on to these new tricks being such an old dog. We're moving closer to the inlaws.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Quote memories from my generation (b. 1956):

Fireman.
Astronaut.
Policeman.
Soldier.
Doctor.

Mind's ear view of the current generation:

Stock broker.
CEO.
Lawyer.
Celebrity [fill-in-blank].
Lottery winner.

From my POV, it used to be what we could do; now it's what we can have. IMO, the moral failing of our society as a whole has been allowing the shift from knowing what my place will be to knowing what my reward/profit will be and deciding what place to aim for accordingly.

I was going to end the post there, but the inner curmudgeon is tired and not willing to allow some to make a bad assumption: by "place", I mean that to which we can reasonably aspire based on native talent, personal motivation and opportunity, not implying the "being kept in one's place" pejorative connotation. This also serves to illustrate why I have such a deep and abiding contempt for political correctness, because it's used to allow people to pretend they can do anything when they clearly are not suited or capable of nearly all of "anything", and cannot in their greed abide by their native potential.

Rod, I call it the cult of entitlement. I call it a cult intending all of the negative connotations thereof.

I've started making my own beer, so as long as this "Depression" (snort!) doesn't affect the ability to get the ingredients, or the water I use to boil my shoes so I can have dinner isn't made too impure, I'll be fine.

Seriously, what depression? And says who? A confederacy of no name bloggers who celebrate bad news and pray for the worst to happen? Please...

Speaking of austerity, guess who's back from the sunny Middle East? This girl. Got in day before yesterday. Halloween was fun. I am wired and exhausted and jetlagged and a touch disoriented.

AB - That's great to hear. Was wondering when you'd get back. I'm sure it's good to be home.

As for austerity...well, I hope they didn't lose your luggage. When I returned, ours got misplaced somewhere between Kuwait & Lejeune, such that we ended up living out of our day packs for a week _after_ we got Stateside. Of course, that was still less austere than Iraq....

Seriously, what depression? And says who? A confederacy of no name bloggers who celebrate bad news and pray for the worst to happen? Please...

I'm sorry, but you don't know what you're talking about. Last night I was at a social event, and met a guy who works for a hedge fund here in Dallas. He said that construction projects all over town are shutting down or going on hiatus for lack of money. All this is going to pass through other parts of the local economy like earthquake tremors. My dad told me this morning that a new housing development that was going to go in down the street from him next year is now frozen, because the developers can't secure credit from the banks. And on and on. Just because you don't see it happening this morning, November 1, doesn't mean it's not happening beneath the surface. The tsunami that wiped out Phuket started as an earthquake at the bottom of the ocean, that nobody could see. It took time for the force of that event to make its way to the surface, so to speak.

What I'm trying to work out is how a beer as vile as Heineken could possible count as luxury.

I have to agree with you rombald but I'm probably biased as Heineken is much cheaper than Bulmers(aka Magners outside of Ireland) which is what I drink.

And to think, to me Miller Genuine Draft is a luxury.

Franklin's first comment reminded me of something-the way we promote college attendance as the be all and end all of a young person's educational life. There are a lot of people, I will guess half or more, who would be better off in a vocational program of some type. Yet I often sense that there is a stigma if you have chosen that path.

Electrical Line Workers are hard to find, and well compensated. Current linemen are retiring in droves. It's not a trade you can learn in college, but if there were no linemen there would be no colleges. As a society we should encourage people who want to pursue these careers, rather than push four year schools on them.

"Last night I was at a social event, and met a guy who works for a hedge fund here in Dallas. He said that construction projects all over town are shutting down or going on hiatus for lack of money. All this is going to pass through other parts of the local economy like earthquake tremors."

But for how long? Six months or six years. Because that's the difference between an economic crisis and a true depression, especially in overbuilt, overleveraged Dallas. Of course building is going to slow, but does that mean it's a sign of a depression? Really?

Instead of seeing things as 3/4 empty instead of half empty, I think we need to be a little rational about what this economic crisis means. This isn't 1928. While we may be on the verge of an economic refocusing=--which includes, finally, better energy policy--I think it's an overstatement that we are the verge of an economic tsunami. There's just no support for that.

Jim R. reminds me of my experience of the technology shifts from the 80s to the 90s. I went to a local trade school (1989-90) to learn computer programming (why is a long story). In my class of 40 or so, I was the only one without a college degree. I was also one of two or three in the class who was already computer literate. The first third of the course was DOS, Windows and PC software. I was a popular guy for those months.

All of those bachelor degrees couldn't find a job in their fields of study. None of them had acquired much of anything useful in college for the major needs of the companies of the time. Not one of them were slackers, don't get me wrong, but then slackers would not have chosen to go into further school-loan debt to take a 13-month program, 12 hours per week on top of full-time jobs, some of them with families.

AnotherBeliever: Welcome home, and thank you for your service to our country. May you enjoy your respite from your duties; it has been richly earned and is well-deserved.

As far as beer goes: I don't drink beer (The Big D Type 2 and beer simply do NOT go together, so there it is). If you have any diet soda, however, I'll be happy to drain your stocks dry. (Got any diet Pocono ?)

Entitlement mentality ? Not in my house or office, chummer. Being self-employed, my motto is--it has to be--You Eat What You Kill. Any self-employed person knows that; most of the time, more than half the battle consists of actually getting paid for the work you've done. If I had a $ 5 bill for every client who's stiffed me over 18 years in practice, I'd own a current-model Lamborghini; the kind with the hand-tooled leather seats.

Slothful ways ? Yeah, right. While a break would be nice (it's been four years since I had a vacation), I've got a stay-at-home wife and 5 kids to feed. Being well rested doesn't matter worth a hang when it comes time to pay the electric bill, or when the mechanic wants his $ 650 for that brake job.

I'll just have to do my sleeping after the war.

Your servant,

Lord Karth

Rod, I'm totally with your dad; there's something intrinsically satisfying about tasks like that (I think your brain learns to do its best thinking when your body is physically occupied). And once you get in the habit of doing work like that, you crave it.

It was probably some old Chinese guy who said that it's not the destination that's important, but the journey. Chopping wood is like taking a quick trip that clears your mind.

Great thread; wasn't going to post, don't have much to say, but it's good to "see" Rod and some old names. Ironically, while I'm working through a lot of very difficult personal/family issues currently, thank God my work has been very stable and doesn't appear likely to be impacted by the downturn unless something very major changes.

I agree with Franklin's emphasis on "what we do"; what's striking to me is noting the differences in my own disposition towards work in general and the perspective of my peers, and younger folks in their 20's and 30's. There really doesn't seem to be enough curiosity in our society. While I love splitting wood and have acquired all sorts of oddball life/professional skills over the years, from forklift driving to small business accounting to high level project management, I have always just felt in my bones the lessons of my grandma, who went through the depression and pretty much raised me: learn skills, acquire tools, get to know the ins and outs of your place, treat people well, present yourself with respect, and you'll be OK no matter the times.

That's certainly seemed to be the case for me, in part because of the paucity of the competition. I'm continually struck by how many folks (fellows, I'm mostly thinking of) simply can't succeed professionally because they just don't know how, for lack of a better term, to "play the game".

Bless,
Doug

"About Guinness-the stuff is absolutely delicious in Ireland.Here though it's barely potable."

If that's the case, O Lord help me if I ever get to Ireland! I love the stuff here (and the great joke above too).

Thanks for the warm welcomes, all. MI, thank goodness we didn't lose our luggage. Mainly because we moved en masse as a unit, and physically moved every benighted piece of it ourselves, from points A to G, and all points between, with a couple backtracked for good measure. Sigh. The duffles become ridiculously heavy once you add full body armor and four plates.

Guinness is also my favorite. I think it tastes like chocolate.

It's only slowly sinking in that I am really back. I went for a run out to the nature trail yesterday. It was sunny, about 33, half the snow was melted. Some of the trees still had leaves, as this last frost and subsequent snow were fairly precipitous. It was beautiful. I finally stopped to take in the view. And, for the first time in a very long time, I heard silence. My ears were ringing from it. I could make out the very quiet sound of a tiny creek at my feet, and some Canada geese out on the pond, and once or twice a diesel shifting down Route 26 about two miles away. Other than that, silence. It was amazing.

There isn't ever any quiet in Iraq, as everything runs on generators, plus there's the noise of air conditioners, computer servers, traffic, the firing range, helicopters, and even the occasional thing blowing up. I think it may be part of the reason some of us get so unbalanced. There's no quiet.