Deaths from falling out of bed in the USGerman beer consumption per capita
It seems unlikely on its face that the American bedroom rug and the Bavarian biergarten would have much to say to each other, but between 2008 and 2020 they have been saying it in opposite directions (r = -0.960) with a consistency that almost feels coordinated. Americans fell from their beds at ever-higher rates; Germans drank ever less beer per person. Both trends are, ultimately, about aging and different cultural responses to it.
The demographic stories here are mirror images. American deaths from falls climbed with the aging of the Boomer generation, while German beer consumption per capita dropped from about 112 liters per year to under 93 liters as a younger German cohort shifted toward wine, hard seltzer, and the startling innovation of non-alcoholic beer (now about 8% of the German market). The correlation is the collision of a country growing older without growing more temperate and a country growing older and more temperate, arranged on opposite sides of a graph for reasons of arithmetic rather than meaning.
One culture falls. One sobers up. Neither has anything to do with the other, despite the graph.
As an Amazon Associate, getspurious.com earns from qualifying purchases. Learn more.
Want to learn more about why correlations like “Deaths from falling out of bed in the US” vs “German beer consumption per capita” don't prove causation? Read our guide to statistical thinking.
