I need it. I WANT it! A rather philosophical question on consumerism.

[BelgianMadCow]

We all have needs.
Those needs are met by the production of goods and services.
We become ever more efficient in that production - productivity goes up.

If the set of needs stays the same, that means less and less people are required for that production.
The number of people living on the planet is increasing.

So unless new "needs" are created, a lot of people don't need to be a part of that production system in the future. One could say, in a world ruled by capitalism, these people would be unemployed, so they would not longer be viable consumers.

So new needs ARE being created all of the time. Whether they actually correspond to REAL needs, is another matter. Is an mp3 player costing 200 dollars really that much better than the walkman of the eighties? Are we happier with a huge flatscreen TV?

I contend that the true needs we have as a society do NOT change that much.

And I wonder, what would happen if we were all aware of our consumerism, and stopped being blinded by the latest must-have?

What would all those people DO? Take turns working and spend half of the year educating themselves?


BMC

disclaimer : this from an engineer in technical marketing. Create the imagined fear and solve it with your branded product...

[hobbit709]

1. There's lots of things I WANT

But I know that most of them are things I DON'T need. I worry about "want" after I take care of "need"

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

2. As far as this sort of thing is concerned...

Being demonstrably poor, as I am, is a blessing in disguise. It has taught me what I REALLY need and what is just some illusion.

[lumberjack_jeff]

4. Being poor, as a short term state, has much to recommend it.

As a chronic condition, not so much.

[BelgianMadCow]

7. a blessing in disguise... how apt

coming from an upper middle class family, it was a DU thread on "are you living above, at or under your means" that has really opened my eyes.

Getting a medical condition that severely impacts my professional options has made it into more than abstract discussion for me too. I am glad I had digested that thread beforehand, because it made me ask my wife "what would you do if we had significantly less" and she said "I couldn't really care". That was very liberating.

I guess many of the hardships we survive teach us valuable lessons. Many never learn anything of the like though and no matter how rich, they are poor in reality I think.

[stirlingsliver]

3. I Need Information

I need information.

More precisely, I ablsolute MUST know all the comings and goings of:

Britney Spears
Linsey Lowan
New York
Tom Cruise


I also NEED to know how 16-year-old young women celebrate their super sweet 16 birthday.

And I absolutely MUST know who America's Next Top Model is going to be.

And, I am already starting to panic because there is NO American Idol on TV!!

Thank the goddess there is a program that will identify America's Most Smartest Model for me.

[BelgianMadCow]

6. And unfortunately, we have that here as well

used to be that TV had real information. Still does, but we now have

Our version of american Idol (twice)
Celebs on Ice
The Beauty and the Nerd
Top actor, top singer
and so on..

Either always using the same local *cough* stars, or pretending to suggest anyone can become one (while in reality, they hardly ever live past the next season).

The ultimate way of sedating the happy consumers, while true inflation skyrockets and the middle class is killed.

Good point.

[redqueen]

5. Learning the difference between wants and needs

is easy when you grow up poor.

In my case the habit of evaluating which is which has served me well throughout my life, during times when I had extra money and times like now, when I don't.

[ozone_man]

8. Enough is as good as a feast.

It's not easy to see past the consumer model that is packaged for us and sold through marketing. BMC, I'm the engineer that designs the products that engineers like you market. :)

In the immediate future, we'll be seeing a sharp drop-off in consumer spending, which makes up 2/3 of GDP, now that the cheap credit is gone and home equity loans are spent.

But there is something wholesome about recognizing that we don't need half the crap that we buy. The best things in life aren't things. Enough is as good as a feast. Two of my favorite quotes.

[BelgianMadCow]

13. The best things in life aren't things

that is beautiful. I thought about including a guess at real needs like family and love but decided against it for fear of being too hippie ;-)

It's kind of hard to really let these things sink in and still do what you do for a living, isn't it?
If I let my mind loose on this, I end up wanting to sell everything I have here and go to work as an engineer in Africa...but family and roots prevent that (and probably, some wanting too, alas).

My wife works in a hospital and I envy her in a way, at the end of the day she know she has done GOOD for the society as a whole. Even if I bring home double the pay check, I'm much less sure...

[ozone_man]

14. In another life I could be in Africa

maybe working on renewable energy for off grid power systems or working on renewable energy R&D. Half of our company is biomedical, so that is rewarding, but some is in areas that I would say don't improve the overall quality of life.

Back in college I was planning to get into solar cell R&D, but the funding for renewable energy was insufficient. I like many other EE's worked in semiconductor technology for companies like IBM, or in aerospace or biomedical.

My wife is a teacher, so that balances things out some.

In general though, we should move toward a society that makes things that have social value, less defense spending and more money in sustainable energy, and recycling technology.

[BelgianMadCow]

16. I hear you on environmental engineering!

wish that choice was around when I was studying - and may try and get into it nonetheless. Gamesa Eolica has been booming in wind energy. If you drive through Germany, there's wind farms everywhere. Apparently the new thing Gore is getting into is a venture capital firm backing small scale renewable energy sources - maybe we can get some money, you design it and I'll sell it ;-)

You are about the only one who has started to think about what we COULD and would do if we had our priorities straight - which was really the point of my OP. Not to say the other contributions weren't worthwile, but I was thinking further...
Just imagine what we could do with the brain capacity that goes into the continuation of consumerism...

On things that have social value: for example a mom or dad staying at home - a big service to society if you ask me, but increasingly less feasible - because it isn't rewarded!

[ozone_man]

22. Here's a local wind energy company.

(in Vermont) They're very successful and make wind measurement equipment, mostly in developing countries that are off the grid.

http://www.nrgsystems.com/

I read this past week of a huge wind project just over in NY. 400 turbines to generate 320MW power. There is some resistance in Vermont so far, but the NY project might change some perception.

The wind farm area includes the towns of Martinsburg, Lowville, Watson and Harrisburg in Lewis County on the Tug Hill Plateau, about 75 miles northeast of Syracuse. The Maple Ridge project has been named to honor the maple sugaring tradition in Lewis County, the leading maple syrup producing county in New York. The first phase of Maple Ridge is 231 megawatts (MW), using 140, 1.65 MW Vestas turbines. Additional turbines under construction for Phase 2 will bring the total to 195 turbines producing 320 MW of electricity, enough to power up 160,000 average New York homes.

Upon full build-out, the Maple Ridge wind farm will prevent the annual emission of approximately 586,117 tons of carbon dioxide, 627 tons of nitrogen oxide (which causes smog), and more than 812 tons of sulfur dioxide (which causes acid rain). This is the equivalent of taking approximately 105,000 cars off the road.

http://www.ppmenergy.com/rel_06.09.26.html

[MadHound]

9. What appalls me is how much and how many people simply throw shit away

Before its usefulness is finished. The average consumer gets a new car something like every three years. Computers, stereos, TVs, all of that people simply go out and get more and toss out the old. Repair shops have become a thing of the past, because people would rather simply toss something away and buy new rather than repair it. Cell phones, clothing, virtually anything that you can think of is routinely tossed before its useful life is complete.

I just don't get this mentality. I believe in getting as much out of something as possible. My stereo is fifteen years old and still sounds fine. My cars are nine years old, and run good. I came from a background where everything was used to its full potential, and if it broke, it was fixed. Now, people simply toss perfectly good shit away, all to have the newest, hippest, whatever.

The admen have done their job, they have turned a country of rational thinking citizens into a country of shallow, self centered, consumerist sheeple.

[BelgianMadCow]

11. No more repair shops... and most repairs will exactly be too much

so it's "better to get a new one".

Your nine year old car, you can probably still do some stuff yourself on or have it done by anyone.
Modern day car electronics make that impossible.

Your stereo is probably way sturdier and better looking than what we get now. Big solid knobs mmmm....Call it vintage!

I applaud you. I still have WAY to go. It's like an addiction.

[no_hypocrisy]

10. The GNP of this country depends upon people buying stuff they don't need

and can't explain why they want it.

[MadHound]

12. Frankly I think that they are using material goods to try and fill and emotional/spiritual void.

Sad really, but there it is.

[mitchum]

19. And I agree with you

[Selatius]

15. I like Star Trek as a reference here. In their world, people work to better themselves, not to...

work just to pay the bills or keep up with the Joneses in the pursuit of materialism. Things such as food production and housing apparently aren't issues anymore in Gene Roddenberry's vision of the future, and because people are freed from needs such as food, shelter, water, the necessity for money for the purchase of goods like food became less, and that necessarily means the necessity of developing new products and generate new demand for those new products also decreases.

As a result, people didn't have to work as much just to live, freeing people up to pursue other things, such as knowledge of the universe, technological advancement, or even the pursuit of simply trying to know oneself and come to terms with that.

[BelgianMadCow]

17. You picked up on the idea behind my OP there

Thanks!

I just wonder what we would and could do with the brain power and force of all the people that could be freed up...

I imagine in a distant future one giant machine with one operator producing all that we need - and what will the others do?

As you said, even the pursuit of knowing oneself, or working to better ourselves as a society...
I imagine a lot of focus on the arts, philosophy, psychology as well. And science and education, of course.
I think it would get us out of this "history repeats itself" cycle of rise and fall of empires.

Star Trek references are good too :-)

:hi:

[Selatius]

25. With that kind of talent freed up, we could address things such as hunger, war, and poverty worldwid

It seems a fundamental issue facing mankind is competition for scarce resources when the more logical solution is mutual cooperation as far as the sharing of resources. Unfortunately, I don't predict much change in the status quo unless there's a radical shift in society's view on living and sustainable development is achieved, and such shifts usually come about in gradual steps and sometimes rapid ones, usually precipitated by disasters. The point, however, is to shift before those disasters happen.

[Liberal_in_LA]

27. Trek rules!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. Paying cash for everything is an amazing way to cut down on "needs".

We've been doing it for years. It's incredible how many of those just gotta' have gizmos loose their appeal if you have to save for them.

Also, has anyone noticed that when you indulge in those "money saving" specials and sales, you always end up with less money? A guy I worked with went bankrupt by "saving" money on sales.

[BelgianMadCow]

24. Over here it's pretty customary too

people hardly use their credit cards, except people that can really afford it.

People will have a loan on a house and a car and that's it. Credit card debt isn't much of an issue here (yet- they're trying).

And especially with electronics you can be sure the "money-saving offer" is a way to get rid of old stuff. I was looking for a home theatre for my dad, read up on it, and for practically all household use, high definition has NOTHING over HD-ready because you acnnot see the diff at the typical viewing distance... The amount of crap salespeople will (sometimes unknowingly) unload on customers is mindboggling.

[Ron Green]

20. The Free Market runs best on slavery, alienation and addiction.

Thus are created and maintained those "needs" that keep the wheels of consumerism turning. Community involvement and personal integrity are hard, but fear and shopping are easy.

This is what finally gives the lie to Libertarianism. Corporate propaganda and the manufacture of consensus work so well in the modern world that it's imperative the government (local and central) be influenced at least as much by moral and ethical institutions as by commercial ones.

[renate]

21. ALL the research on happiness says that money can't buy it

Once a certain level of security, housing, food, health etc is met, of course. Money is most definitely linked to happiness if survival is threatened.

But after about $50,000 (this surely depends on the part of the country you're in--$50K makes you rich in Omaha, but poor and hungry in San Francisco), happiness pretty much levels off even when income goes up. There's a little uptick when the lottery is won or the raise is given, but as a rule it doesn't last long and people generally go back to the level of happiness they were at before. But very few people know this as a fact (they may hope it's true, but they don't know that the research has actually been done), and they aren't being told so by the commercials on TV.

New stuff can be fun, and I do enjoy shopping, but the problem with a huge flatscreen TV is that it decreases the possibility of true contentment with a 13-inch black and white. The flatscreen doesn't really make you happier once the novelty is gone and you're used to it, but it's raised your standards of what's acceptable in a TV.

[BelgianMadCow]

23. That is pretty interesting renate!

Didn't know either it was really investigated.

Money can't buy you love (or only the fake kind)...

[renate]

26. I think it's pretty interesting, too!

I've read a fair amount about the research behind happiness and it seems to be really comparative--it's either about comparing oneself with the neighbors (people earning $100,000 in a neighborhood where the average salary is $75,000 are much much happier than people earning $200,000 in a neighborhood where the average salary is $250,000) or it's something even more basic; when people are asked to list five things they're grateful for (in the form of "I'm glad that...") they then score significantly higher (really significantly) on a happiness scale than people who've been asked to list five things they would like to change ("I wish that..."). So people who choose to be grateful, or who come by a feeling of gratitude naturally, are going to be much happier than people who have nearly everything but desperately wish they had everything.

This article isn't entirely about what I just said, but it's kind of interesting and it's a quick read: http://www.newsweek.com/id/43884

[earth mom]

28. Money & things don't buy happiness.

The sooner that we realize this truth, then the sooner we can look for what does make us happy. I realized this truth years ago and so I don't have an Ipod or a flat screen t.v. or an SUV in the driveway. But I do have the things I cherish beyond measure, my own home, a loving family, pets, books, art supplies, fabric, sewing machine and some cool craft supplies/projects because being able to create is a necessity for me! The things I want these days have to do with fixing up our fixer upper house-a necessity not an HGTV extravaganza-and wanting desperately to travel and see the world before I'm too old to do so.


Here's more food for thought that I just read on Rosie O'Donnells blog:


Michele writes:

Rosie,,If the people who you gave the $100,ooo to didn’t use the money to better their lives and the others around them. Then you gave the wrong people the money.

Rosie:

listen
it complicated
i have given millions and watched miracles happen
but i know
money is not the answer

Colleen writes:

Ro-When u gave $100,00 to change a persons life and nothing changed did u ever think u gave it to the wrong person. Im a young teacher, $100,000 would change A LOT in my world-Not that I’m asking :o)

Rosie:

i have given it to many
and on the whole
i would say it didnt change anything

i know it seems like it would
but - it doesnt