But then again, all of this makes sense.

For the vast majority of alcohol vendors, the only real incentive they have as businesspeople not to sell alcohol to minors is the threat of punishment (in the form of fines and/or being closed down) from the government.

If the government owns the given store, the employees have no stake in the profits whatsoever, and the likelyhood of the government fining itself seems pretty slim to me.

So what do we get from all of this?

  • We have a law no one cares about.
  • We have a special governement control that no one wants entirely to enforce said law.
  • But in the end it only aids those wishing to break the law to do so easily.
That's brilliant. I now think the Pennsylvania Commonwealth only exists for the benefit of sixteen year old troublemakers.