Monday, March 7, 2011

Legal Drinking Age

We odered beer while my friends and I were out for dinner tonight. As usual, a server came to check our ID. One of my friends brought up a interesting question, he asked " At what age when you first drank alcohol? And what is the legal drinking age in China?"
After home, I still have this question in my head, and it blew up to a bigger related question. It made me wonder the legal drinking age worldwide. Then I did some research. I figured out the following data.

Drinking and Purchasing of Alcohol Is Illegal

  • Libya
  • Sudan
  • Saudi Arabia
  • Kuwait
  • Bangladesh
  • Iran
  • Pakistan ( for foreign nationals (non muslims) the legal drinking age is 21)

Legal Drinking Age = None

  • Albania
  • Brunei
  • Denmark
  • Poland
  • Mauritius
  • Georgia
  • Cambodia
  • Malaysia
  • Macau
  • Philippines
  • Gibraltar
  • Slovakia
  • Netherlands
  • Italy
  • Slovenia
  • New Zealand
  • Malta
  • Norway
  • Portugal
  • Romania
  • Serbia
  • Swaziland
  • Thailand
  • Greece
  • Finland

Legal Drinking Age = 14

  • Spain

Legal Drinking Age = 16

  • Lebanon
  • Eritrea
  • Austria
  • Bulgeria
  • Botswana
  • Zimbabwe
  • France
  • Luxembourg
  • Germany
  • Switzerland (16-18)
  • Samoa

Legal Drinking Age = 17

  • Cyprus

Legal Drinking Age = 18

  • Ghana
  • Kenya
  • Canada (18-19)
  • Puerto Rico
  • Algeria
  • Cameroon
  • Malawi
  • South Africa
  • Argentina
  • China
  • Hong Kong
  • Jordan
  • Israel
  • Fiji
  • Australia
  • Ukraine
  • Sweden
  • Russia
  • Latvia
  • Hungary
  • Singapore
  • Croatia
  • Belarus
  • Sri Lanka
  • Taiwan
  • Mongolia
  • Guatemala
  • Honduras
  • Ecuador
  • Columbia
  • Chile
  • Uganda

Legal Drinking Age = 19

  • South Korea

Legal Drinking Age = 20

  • Japan
  • Paraguay

Legal Drinking Age = 21

  • United States Of America
  • Indonesia
  • Palau

 I guess the U.S. teenager may want to travel Spain after reading that. It's because so many teenagers are curious about drinking, JUST LIKE MY COUSINS! While we are drinking wine in family dinner, they always get their glasses ready by the side, pretented they are adults, actually they are just 14 years old.

1 comment:

  1. It's interesting to see a world-wide comparison of drinking. While looking over your list, it's interesting to see which culture entrusts their children the responsibility of limiting their own drinking at what age. It's also funny to see how there is no limit before 14 years of age, but after there is a variety of ages.

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