People in Ireland are spending more money on alcohol despite the chronic financial crisis that continues to grip the nation, official figures have revealed.
While many reined in their spending on things like clothing, transport and communication last year, people were less thrifty with booze.
Figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) showed around 6.36 billion euro was spent on alcohol – up 1.2% from the year before.
That accounted for around 7.7% of total personal expenditure of 82.63 billion euro on goods and services.
While spending on alcohol, as calculated by the CSO at current market prices, increased each year from 2009, spending on tobacco was down in 2012.
It dropped by 2.4% from 2.2 billion euro in 2011 to 2.14 billion euro last year.
