October 4, 2006
Study Backs Blue Laws
Remember when stores were closed on Sundays?
According to a new medical research study, closing stores on Sunday or at least restricting the sale of alcohol on that day makes a lot of sense, reports Reuters.
A group of researchers studied the number of alcohol-related traffic accidents and deaths in New Mexico since the state repealed its “Blue Laws” in 1995. According to the study findings, there were 543 additional alcohol-related crashes (a 29 percent increase) on Sundays in the five years after the ban was lifted. A total of 42 alcohol-related crash deaths (a 42 percent increase) occurred during that period.
Dr. Garnett McMillan of the Behavioral Health Research Center of the Southwest in Albuquerque, New Mexico, said in a statement, “For the first time, we have real data on whether blue laws actually protect public health. Today’s study finds that the Sunday ban saved lives and prevented hundreds of injuries and fatalities from alcohol-related crashes.”
Under New Mexico’s old law, alcohol could only be purchased in bars and restaurants on Sundays. Licensed stores are now permitted to sell alcohol between noon and midnight on Sundays.
Discussion Question: What is your reaction to this story and the need (or not) for blue laws?
BrainTrust
Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
Poll
On a side note: Chik-fil-A does just fine with their self-imposed day off. It’s a shame more business people don’t put their money where their beliefs are like Truett Cathy.
I predict my fellow commentators will throw lots of rocks at this one, and that will likely also be the consensus of “the public.” So it’s sort of a non-starter. Better to focus on alcohol education and enforcement. From pure pragmatism, the research time and money would be better spent there.
Did I miss something? Is says alcohol related crashes went up on Sunday. So what about about the rest of the week? Maybe the number of alcohol related accidents went down. Sure they went up on Sunday, but what was the overall picture for the entire week? I have a feeling that the number of accidents has just been more equally spread out and perhaps did not go up.
This is really two separate but related discussions. One is the idea of prohibiting the sale of an intoxicating substance on a day that correlates with a dominant religion’s traditional “day of rest.” The other is the idea of using that religiously-defined day of rest in such a way that it benefits family life by keeping people out of the stores, and presumably with their families.
To the first point: prohibition does not work (our national experiment many decades ago proved that it only makes the banned product even more alluring), and alcohol is certainly not the only intoxicant available in New Mexico on Sunday (the others are, however, illegal). So like others here, I question the study, and assume that either the creators of it or the media reporting on it have confused causation with correlation.
To the second point: our society has long ago embraced materialism over family life, so what would be the point of reinstating blue laws? Not only would the retail lobby not allow this to happen, neither would the debt-loving banking lobby. Spending is what keeps our shaky economy afloat, and now is not the time to put a new hole in the bottom of the boat.
The article seems to confuse the issues. One point is about whether or not all stores should be closed on Sundays, and the other point is about whether or not liquor stores should be closed on Sundays.
In Texas, we have a weird hybrid: liquor stores that sell only wine and beer can be open 7 days a week, but liquor stores that sell hard liquor must be closed on Sundays.
I have yet to hear a reasonable explanation of that one. Closing liquor stores on any day of the week seems to encourage drunk driving – people just drive across a state border or wherever they have to go to get to one that’s open. I think that would happen with the “all stores” laws too – people would just drive to the next county or the next state to shop, and whichever place re-enacted its blue law would see their tax revenues drop.
I believe better education and very tough laws on drunk driving are some of the ways to curb the abuse of alcohol. And the education part should start in our elementary schools and continue thru high school to convince young people that intoxication and the abuse of alcohol is “not cool.” Adopting “blue laws” is a giant step backwards that really didn’t work well at the time and punished the vast majority of people who didn’t have a drinking problem. If you restrict the purchase of alcohol on Sunday, you’ll just have people buying it earlier in the week or finding another way to find a bottle.
Like all studies, there are far more questions to be answered than have been asked (except by RW commentators, of course). It surely isn’t as simple as the headline implies. Far more important is that old saw, personal responsibility, which is usually rolled out when convenient. Let’s not penalise the majority, yet again, for the behaviour of the minority.
This study suffers from all the problems that correlating societal statistics produces. It is the old correlation vs. causation question. So many other things besides the blue laws could have affected the results that there is no way to really know what caused the change. Maybe accidents went up because of demographic changes. Maybe the population age declined (younger drinkers), the suburbs expanded (more driving), or the population simply got denser.
But on the subject of blue laws, putting aside all the business aspects of this it seems to me that society in general could benefit from a forced “day of rest.” Having said that, there would also have to be a second day of rest for all those who provide indispensable services such as emergency workers, power plant operators, and livestock producers.
Alcohol-related blue laws punish everyone. Why not use random statistical sampling roadblocks for Breathalyzer tests along with mandatory jail time for offenders? Why not tax alcohol to pay for this? How about impounding the offenders’ vehicles? It’s senseless to punish everyone in New Mexico when alcohol abuse can be easily identified.
There’s a certain danger implicit in perfect statistical correlations. Since people in New Mexico could buy alcohol in bars in the Blue Law days, one assumes they could have gotten just as drunk as they do now and therefore gotten into just as many accidents. On the other hand, there’s no question that when you lift restrictions on human behavior you increase the number of abusers. For example, raise a speed limit that had been 65 to 70 and you’ll get more people driving at 80. Make it easier for people already inclined to alcohol abuse to purchase alcohol in bulk and you’re going to see an increase in abusive behaviors. There are so many other factors that figure into an issue like this, it’s difficult to describe any cause-effect relationship with certitude. For example, making prohibition the law of the land didn’t eliminate alcohol-related crimes. The bottom line to me is, it’s not about the law, it’s about the law breakers. People have to accept responsibility for their own actions.
The question comes down to whether consumers spend more in stores open seven days than they would if they only had six days to shop. If the answer is no or very little, than retailers should be starting “grass roots” efforts to have Blue Laws reenacted. Their bottom lines and full-time employees would thank them.
Part of me looks back upon the days of the Blue Laws with fond memories. Those memories are of family days. Days when no one was running to the store because of a great sale. A day where Sunday mid-day dinner was a big event. Today, it seems as if we are all running in different directions. Or am I a victim of the tunnel-vision that sometimes accompanies the distant past?
On the other hand, without the Blue Laws, we are able to shop when we want, at times that are convenient to us. It further enables a more relaxed shopping. We don’t need to fit everything into one day. For retailers, it is 52 more days of transactions of revenues and possibly the difference between profits and losses.
The New Mexico study while interesting, is not conclusive. Can’t the argument be made that there are more drinking related deaths because people weren’t working? Are there more drinking related deaths on holidays? Maybe New Mexico doesn’t have strong enough DUI laws.
What is the increase in New Mexico’s population? I’m sure it has grown in the last five years. Maybe the increased number of drivers in the state accounts for some of the increase? It would be interesting to see the percent of accidents and fatalities to the number of registered drivers, or some similar measure.
In reviewing this article, I can not help but think that there is a meaningful study out there that is short of funds because this ridiculous excuse of a “study” wasted the money. Some fundamentalist with an agenda against drinking coupled with the resources and the time could draw the same flimsy correlation between Sunday drunk driving and church attendance but does that mean we should all be forced into the pews? New Mexico is the third poorest state in the US with one of the highest rates of alcoholism and unemployment. The concept that incidences of drunk driving are increasing within this environment by 29% would be an understandable (and perhaps predictable) condition without even considering the effect that repealing the Blue Law would have. What this article is doing at its base is asking retailers to consider their responsibility in providing a means to break the law and self regulating by supporting a fundamentalist Christian effort to re-institute the Blue Laws. I would counter that our roads would be safer if the same effort and expense were spent on increasing the quality of the pavement and the education of the driver. That approach, at least, would benefit the taxpayer instead of the pulpit.
More Discussions
Will AI Cut Warehouse Jobs Or Drive Supply Chain Efficiencies?
Will supply chain slash warehouse jobs, drive up efficiency, or a bit of both?Is Commerce Now Happening Inside the Moment? Insights From Our Private Mastermind
What insights are most notable from our latest Private Mastermind?Are Current Staffing Levels Harming Customer Service and Store Standards?
Are inadequate staffing levels harming retail customer service and store standards?
On a side note: Chik-fil-A does just fine with their self-imposed day off. It’s a shame more business people don’t put their money where their beliefs are like Truett Cathy.
I predict my fellow commentators will throw lots of rocks at this one, and that will likely also be the consensus of “the public.” So it’s sort of a non-starter. Better to focus on alcohol education and enforcement. From pure pragmatism, the research time and money would be better spent there.
Did I miss something? Is says alcohol related crashes went up on Sunday. So what about about the rest of the week? Maybe the number of alcohol related accidents went down. Sure they went up on Sunday, but what was the overall picture for the entire week? I have a feeling that the number of accidents has just been more equally spread out and perhaps did not go up.
This is really two separate but related discussions. One is the idea of prohibiting the sale of an intoxicating substance on a day that correlates with a dominant religion’s traditional “day of rest.” The other is the idea of using that religiously-defined day of rest in such a way that it benefits family life by keeping people out of the stores, and presumably with their families.
To the first point: prohibition does not work (our national experiment many decades ago proved that it only makes the banned product even more alluring), and alcohol is certainly not the only intoxicant available in New Mexico on Sunday (the others are, however, illegal). So like others here, I question the study, and assume that either the creators of it or the media reporting on it have confused causation with correlation.
To the second point: our society has long ago embraced materialism over family life, so what would be the point of reinstating blue laws? Not only would the retail lobby not allow this to happen, neither would the debt-loving banking lobby. Spending is what keeps our shaky economy afloat, and now is not the time to put a new hole in the bottom of the boat.
The article seems to confuse the issues. One point is about whether or not all stores should be closed on Sundays, and the other point is about whether or not liquor stores should be closed on Sundays.
In Texas, we have a weird hybrid: liquor stores that sell only wine and beer can be open 7 days a week, but liquor stores that sell hard liquor must be closed on Sundays.
I have yet to hear a reasonable explanation of that one. Closing liquor stores on any day of the week seems to encourage drunk driving – people just drive across a state border or wherever they have to go to get to one that’s open. I think that would happen with the “all stores” laws too – people would just drive to the next county or the next state to shop, and whichever place re-enacted its blue law would see their tax revenues drop.
I believe better education and very tough laws on drunk driving are some of the ways to curb the abuse of alcohol. And the education part should start in our elementary schools and continue thru high school to convince young people that intoxication and the abuse of alcohol is “not cool.” Adopting “blue laws” is a giant step backwards that really didn’t work well at the time and punished the vast majority of people who didn’t have a drinking problem. If you restrict the purchase of alcohol on Sunday, you’ll just have people buying it earlier in the week or finding another way to find a bottle.
Like all studies, there are far more questions to be answered than have been asked (except by RW commentators, of course). It surely isn’t as simple as the headline implies. Far more important is that old saw, personal responsibility, which is usually rolled out when convenient. Let’s not penalise the majority, yet again, for the behaviour of the minority.
This study suffers from all the problems that correlating societal statistics produces. It is the old correlation vs. causation question. So many other things besides the blue laws could have affected the results that there is no way to really know what caused the change. Maybe accidents went up because of demographic changes. Maybe the population age declined (younger drinkers), the suburbs expanded (more driving), or the population simply got denser.
But on the subject of blue laws, putting aside all the business aspects of this it seems to me that society in general could benefit from a forced “day of rest.” Having said that, there would also have to be a second day of rest for all those who provide indispensable services such as emergency workers, power plant operators, and livestock producers.
Alcohol-related blue laws punish everyone. Why not use random statistical sampling roadblocks for Breathalyzer tests along with mandatory jail time for offenders? Why not tax alcohol to pay for this? How about impounding the offenders’ vehicles? It’s senseless to punish everyone in New Mexico when alcohol abuse can be easily identified.
There’s a certain danger implicit in perfect statistical correlations. Since people in New Mexico could buy alcohol in bars in the Blue Law days, one assumes they could have gotten just as drunk as they do now and therefore gotten into just as many accidents. On the other hand, there’s no question that when you lift restrictions on human behavior you increase the number of abusers. For example, raise a speed limit that had been 65 to 70 and you’ll get more people driving at 80. Make it easier for people already inclined to alcohol abuse to purchase alcohol in bulk and you’re going to see an increase in abusive behaviors. There are so many other factors that figure into an issue like this, it’s difficult to describe any cause-effect relationship with certitude. For example, making prohibition the law of the land didn’t eliminate alcohol-related crimes. The bottom line to me is, it’s not about the law, it’s about the law breakers. People have to accept responsibility for their own actions.
The question comes down to whether consumers spend more in stores open seven days than they would if they only had six days to shop. If the answer is no or very little, than retailers should be starting “grass roots” efforts to have Blue Laws reenacted. Their bottom lines and full-time employees would thank them.
Part of me looks back upon the days of the Blue Laws with fond memories. Those memories are of family days. Days when no one was running to the store because of a great sale. A day where Sunday mid-day dinner was a big event. Today, it seems as if we are all running in different directions. Or am I a victim of the tunnel-vision that sometimes accompanies the distant past?
On the other hand, without the Blue Laws, we are able to shop when we want, at times that are convenient to us. It further enables a more relaxed shopping. We don’t need to fit everything into one day. For retailers, it is 52 more days of transactions of revenues and possibly the difference between profits and losses.
The New Mexico study while interesting, is not conclusive. Can’t the argument be made that there are more drinking related deaths because people weren’t working? Are there more drinking related deaths on holidays? Maybe New Mexico doesn’t have strong enough DUI laws.
What is the increase in New Mexico’s population? I’m sure it has grown in the last five years. Maybe the increased number of drivers in the state accounts for some of the increase? It would be interesting to see the percent of accidents and fatalities to the number of registered drivers, or some similar measure.
In reviewing this article, I can not help but think that there is a meaningful study out there that is short of funds because this ridiculous excuse of a “study” wasted the money. Some fundamentalist with an agenda against drinking coupled with the resources and the time could draw the same flimsy correlation between Sunday drunk driving and church attendance but does that mean we should all be forced into the pews? New Mexico is the third poorest state in the US with one of the highest rates of alcoholism and unemployment. The concept that incidences of drunk driving are increasing within this environment by 29% would be an understandable (and perhaps predictable) condition without even considering the effect that repealing the Blue Law would have. What this article is doing at its base is asking retailers to consider their responsibility in providing a means to break the law and self regulating by supporting a fundamentalist Christian effort to re-institute the Blue Laws. I would counter that our roads would be safer if the same effort and expense were spent on increasing the quality of the pavement and the education of the driver. That approach, at least, would benefit the taxpayer instead of the pulpit.