November 11, 2011

David Brooks knows nothing about beer

And man is he wrong. Could not be more wrong. In a clever, but I think superficial column on inequality in America, he notes which kinds of inequality are acceptable and which ones are not. But on beer he says this:
Beer inequality is on the way down. There used to be a high status difference between microbrews and regular old Budweiser. In academic jargon, beer had a high Gini Coefficient. But as microbrews went mainstream, these status differences diminished.

Just goes to prove that David Brooks knows nothing about beer or beer snobs.

1 comment:

Noah said...

This convinces me that Brooks likes macro beer.

He got it totally backwards.

The demand for better-brewed craft beer and locally-brewed beer has led the "craft beer" industry has driven a 15% increase in microbrewed beer's total market share and a decline in macro brew.

So, Brooks, that doesn't mean they are nearing equal terms as their numbers close in on one another. That means the demand for better beer is outpacing yellow fizzy water.

To say it in a way Brooks will understand, it's not at all that people equate all beers equally as micro market share surges. It's that more people wish to engage in that snobbery over the macros! That's anything but equal.

But that means Brooks would have to read numbers.