One of my long-running themes for the International economy program here at Lowy has been the importance of the Great Convergence in shaping the international economic environment.
Via Felix Salmon, here's a paper (pdf) looking at the evolution of beer consumption over time and between countries:
'...there have been major changes in beer consumption in the world... per capita consumption has decreased in traditional 'beer drinking nations' while it increased strongly in emerging economies....Beer consumption initially increases with rising incomes, but at higher levels of income beer consumption falls'.
Turns out that globalisation is also contributing to a great beer convergence across countries.
Cheers!
Photo by Flickr user indi.ca.
