"Our enormously productive economy...demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, in consumption....We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced, and discarded at an ever increasing rate."

Victor Lebow
U.S. retailing analyst
Journal of Retailing, 1960

Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin point out in Your Money or Your Life that in dealing with workers' demands in the 1920's for shorter work weeks and more leisure time, the 1929 Herbert Hoover Committee on Recent Economic Changes published a strategy as to why giving in to the workers' demands might be a good thing:

"'The survey has proved conclusively what has long been held theoretically to be true, that wants are almost insatiable; that one one want satisfied makes way for another. The conclusion is that economically we have a boundless field before us; that there are new wants which will make way endlessly for newer wants, as fast as they are satisfied...Our situation is fortunate, our momentum is remarkable.'

Instead of leisure time being relaxed activity, it was transformed into an opportunity for consumption...even consumption of leisure itself (as in travel and vacations). Henry Ford concurred:

'..Where people work less they buy more...business is the exchange of goods. Goods are bought only as they meed needs. Needs are filled only as they are felt. They make themselves felt largely in the leisure hours.'" Your Money or Your Life, p. 16

It is nice to know that corporations and marketing gurus have been controlling our entire culture and way of life for at least 80 years. Our children are programmed to consume as early as they can see Elmo's face on the box of crackers. When we take vacations we must go somewhere and buy something...that's what is important, not relaxing. We must be entertained. We must be rewarded for our hard work by purchasing unnecessary items to clutter our starter mansions and 3 car garages. Even better give me a credit card to purchase what I will surely have enough money to pay for someday.

It all reminds me of the grotesque Mr. Creosote character in Monty Python's The Meaning of Life. We are gluttons...consuming until we annihilate ourselves.


posted by Jimmy at 10:12 PM | |