“In March 1933, eight months before the 21st Amendment repealed Prohibition, Congress modified the Volstead Act to allow the production of ‘non-intoxicating’, low-alcohol beer and wine, with a maximum of 4 percent alcohol by volume.

“The new, watered-down beer was a huge hit with the public, which hadn’t tasted a full-strength legal beer since 1917. Dark beers and ales had accounted for some 15 percent of the market before World War I. But in 1936 their share was just 2 to 3 percent. In 1947, researchers at Schwarz Laboratories analyzed the alcohol, hop and malt content of American beers in the 1930s and 1940s and remarked that many of these early post-repeal beers were ‘too hoppy’, ‘too heavy and too filling’ for consumers’ tastes. The report noted “a corrective trend” in which brewers sharply reduced their hop and malt content.”

‘Why bland American beer is here to stay’
Ranjit Dighe
The Conversation
March 13, 2018