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Christopher Ingraham writes in the Washington Post that although 30 percent of Americans don't drink at all and another 30 percent consume, on average less than one drink per week, the top 10 percent of American drinkers - 24 million adults over age 18 - consume, on average, 74 alcoholic drinks per week accounting for well over half of the alcohol consumed in any given year. That works out to a little more than four-and-a-half 750 ml bottles of Jack Daniels, 18 bottles of wine, or three 24-can cases of beer. "I agree that it’s hard to imagine consuming 10 drinks a day," says Philip J. Cook author of "Paying the Tab," an economically-minded examination of the costs and benefits of alcohol control in the US. But "there are a remarkable number of people who drink a couple of six packs a day, or a pint of whiskey." The shape of this usage curve follows a Pareto Distribution which states that the top 20 percent of buyers for most any consumer product account for fully 80 percent of sales. "One consequence is that the heaviest drinkers are of greatly disproportionate importance to the sales and profitability of the alcoholic-beverage industry," writes Cook. "If the top decile somehow could be induced to curb their consumption level to that of the next lower group (the ninth decile), then total ethanol sales would fall by 60 percent."