This paper analyzes whether alcohol and tobacco expenditures of Japanese agricultural households in the interwar period show different patterns or not according to these households’ degree of sociality. Private expenditure of alcohol was suppressed but not tobacco in the households with higher sociality. Alcohol had the strong nature of a tool for social intercourse in the rural area of the interwar period Japan, and therefore households’ degree of sociality might affect the expenditure pattern of alcohol. The results indicate the importance of considering the relationship between community and its members when analyzing the expenditure of goods such as alcohol that have not only habit-forming characteristics but also the nature of the tool for social intercourse.
