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We’ll drink to that.
Google searches for “coffee” hit an all-time high in the U.S. on Election Night, the search-engine giant reported Wednesday.
But people weren’t just chasing a caffeine buzz to follow the contested presidential election between incumbent President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden. Search interest for “alcoholic drink” has also never been higher in the U.S., Alphabet’s GOOGL, +6.08% GOOG, +5.99% Google reported.
What’s more, Google searches for “liquor store near me” also hit a record high, along with lookups for “fries near me.” Check out these charts:
This aligns with tweets from anxious observers on both sides of the political divide on Tuesday and Wednesday, who posted about what they were stress-eating to get through the anticipated delay in calling a winner, since so many mail-in ballots in battleground states had yet to be counted.
See:Here’s what we know about the states whose Electoral College votes haven’t been called
And constant Election Night alerts warning that states were either “too early” or “too close to call” also had many late-night viewers complaining that the stress was driving them to drink.
Granted, more and more Americans have been hitting the sauce this year, period, as the novel coronavirus has killed almost a quarter million Americans, rocked the economy and left millions unemployed. Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Nielsen reported that alcohol sales in stores were up 54% in late March compared with that same period last year, while online alcohol sales spiked 243% as many folks restocked their liquor cabinets and wine cellars while sheltering in place.
A recent study of 1,540 adults ages 30 to 80 published in the journal JAMA Network Open also found that respondents reported drinking 14% more. And American women in particular reported a 41% increase in episodes of heavy drinking (defined as four or more drinks within two hours) in the spring of 2020 as compared with a year earlier. It should be noted that this study drew on data using the RAND Corporation American Life Panel, however, which relied on self-reported data about drinking habits, which isn’t always accurate.
There are more health-conscious ways to cope with stress than chasing a caffeine or alcohol buzz. Here are seven ways that mental-health professionals are calming their own stress about the election.
And here are 20 shows to stream if you need to take your mind off of politics for a little bit.
But if you want to stay in the loop, you can get the latest updates by following MarketWatch’s Election 2020 live blog here.
