High salary contributes to tradies rising rates of drinking alcohol

The building boom could prove to be a bust for the livers of construction workers as new figures reveal drinking rates are on the rise among tradies. Two other professions bucked the trend of falling drinking rates across the country. See where your job sits.

• Why one in three aged 16-24 don’t drink alcohol

The building boom could prove to be a bust for the livers of construction workers as new figures reveal drinking rates are on the rise among tradies because of healthy pay rates.

Experts say the high disposable income rates for tradies — who earn an average of $81,636 a year — has contributed to rising rates of drinking alcohol over the past three years.

Tradespeople were one of just three categories of workers to buck a national trend of falling drinking rates since 2015 revealed in Australian Bureau of Statistics figures.

Steel worker Paul Heffron, right, enjoying a beer with Michael Willcocks. Picture: Jonathan Ng

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The ABS data on how much each occupation drinks per week shows that tradies, farmers and arts and media professionals were the only occupations whose rates of alcohol consumption rose.

Experts say the reason tradies are drinking more is because they’re relatively well paid and the industry has better employment outlook than other labour intensive industries like manufacturing.

The percentage of construction and trades workers who had consumed alcohol in the past week rose from 72.5 per cent in 2015 to 77.5 per cent last year.

The number of farmers drinking rose from 68.6 per cent in 2015 to 76.6 per cent over the same period, but the reasons for their increase in drinking were more sombre, experts said.

Flinders University Associate Professor Ken Pidd said farmers were drinking more because of the stress relief alcohol offered.

“Whenever a job is stressful, physically or emotionally or psychologically, that increases patterns of risky drinking that could be why there has been an increase in consumption,” he said.

He said with the onset of the drought it was unsurprising they were drinking more.

“They’re under high levels of personal and financial stress that can play into consumption rates against the national trend.”

Farmers are drinking more due to the drought that’s making them more stressed.

Prof Kidd said for construction workers having drinks after work was a cultural phenomenon but said alcohol consumption had decreased from the 1980s when it was common for builders to knock back a few schooners at lunchtime.

Arts and media professionals also increased from 66.4 of the workforce to 74.8 to last year.

The figures show that chief executive officers and managers are still the biggest drinkers, although their rate fell slightly over the three year period from 80.8 per cent saying they had consumed alcohol to 77.9 per cent.

Demographer Simon Kuestenmacher said tradies may drink more because they had a relatively high disposable income and would feel comfortable splashing cash at the pub because there was plenty of work in the pipeline.

Overall drinking rates have fallen across many professions.

“We’re still building and construction is up, tradie jobs are not in danger. If I were a tradie I would feel reasonably safe in my job,” he said.

“But if I were to work in manufacturing I hear all those stories of jobs going overseas.”

“As a tradie you work physically hard, you head to the pub with your fellow tradesman at the end of the day. “

Carers and aids dropped from 48.4 per cent having consumed a drink in the past week in 2015 to 41.7 last financial year.