Privatization Opponent Admits State Stores Don’t Dissuade Drunk Drivers

Liquor privatization will kill your father before you go to college or get married.

At least that’s what the UFCW and the PA DUI Association wanted you to believe this spring. Opponents of privatization listed all sorts of social ills they claimed would result from letting private businesses sell alcohol—but the one used the most was the increase of drunk driving and DUIs.

Again and again the facts completely refute these false claims. But now, the director of law enforcement services of the DUI Association refutes it himself.

When asked about the possibility of longer hours at the state stores increasing DUIs, Greg Geisler told the Reading Eagle, “This isn’t alarming to us at all. If they’re predisposed to drinking and driving, they’re going to do that whether the wine and spirits stores are open or not.”

Wait a second. If people are going to drink and drive whether a store is open or not then they will drink and drive whether or not they buy their booze from a state employee or a private business owner.

The former chair of the American Medical Association agrees. In a letter to the Patriot-News, Dr. Raymond Scalettar said, “The reality is that alcohol consumption in the U.S. is far more a function of culture or region than it is a function of being a control state or an open state.”

Point of purchase has nothing to do with whether or not someone commits the crime of drunk driving. I appreciate Geisler debunking the claim once and for all.