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Masci’s Article

Over the past few decades, the United States has developed a consumer culture where shopping and acquisition of goods are now both recreation and obsession. Workers across all industries undergo numerous challenges while trying to make ends meet. Still, the growth of the industry in America has granted people the ability to access and consume goods than before. Large corporations have been emerging, turning the United States into a consumer culture desperately in need for time-saving and other leisure commodities, where individuals can hope to get all they want in shopping malls or by mail order. It is through production and selling of goods and services does capitalism is effective. Moreover, progress and prosperity come as a result of more production and more purchases, hence, growing the economy. However, the due process has an adverse effect to the environment as they involve extraction and use of natural resources by the production companies, whose operations leads to the creation of toxic by-products.

It is fair for shoppers to buy what they want, but of course, the adverse effects of their habits are subject to everyone who is affected. Some people buy kinds of stuff recklessly and end up disposing them carelessly to the environment. The government once more spends taxpayers money to manage that garbage due to the negligence of people. Also, the financial illiteracy of some individuals may affect the economy since their spending behavior may cause the prices of commodities to rise as they can afford, and the vast majority cannot. Perhaps, the few individuals who spend extravagantly on goods and services can sustain the industry at the expense of ordinary civilians with little financial advantage.

It is not right to say that people making all these goods use the money to buy houses, education and build their churches. Arguably, some people producing these goods spend significantly on things like housing and education but not always. In my view, Regalia was biased. Most goods consumed in the United States come from China, Canada, Germany, Mexico, and Japan. Until 2007, most of the goods were imported from Canada, but the market changed and diverted to China. What makes these countries so successful at producing their goods and selling them to the United States is the fact that they can produce them with relatively low cost and at very high quality. People making these goods live differently compared to the larger population in the US. For example, fruits and vegetables come from Mexico on the basis that they can produce them at a significantly low cost, and it leaves the people who create them with very little to boost their lives.

The 2008 recession left the United States economy on its knees as the behavior relating to hyper-consumerism led to the recession. The subprime mortgages granted by the banks to individuals with bad credit records led to a recession that devastated the national economy and the labor markets. The beginning of the recession showed signs when the housing crisis started to fall—many financial institutions invested in real estate as derivative forms viewed home mortgages as sound collateral for MBS. The raising federal taxes and the subprime borrowers left the banks and other financial institutions in a mess as the investments were now worthless, and mortgages lost value. Since the recession, the Federal Reserve took over the mandate to maintain stable prices throughout the economy.

Indeed, consumerism is killing our planet as toxic materials continuous to find their way into the environment. Perhaps, the constant increasing commodity supply requires methods of production and distribution that takes care of the aesthetic environment and other living organisms. Industries should adopt the use of renewable materials and energy to do their production. Also, there should be proper way of managing waste materials that often find their way to the environment.