Subject: Re: Excessive drinking
When a good is made illegal consumers react by squeezing more
consumption into a shorter period of time in order to minimize the chances
of getting caught per unit of pleasure. Thus, it is a common observation
that adults drink more often than teenagers
My understanding of economic rationality is that people act rationally to
maximize what they perceive to be their utility. Thus a forbidden fruit
hypothesis makes sense if and only if people believe they derive utility from
doing something which society at large finds unacceptable, by virtue
