The celebration and advocacy of mass consumerism, the belief that the more we consume the better off we are, in this weekend's Suzanne Savill column is remarkable, particularly in these pretty unprecedented times of credit crunch, economic downturn, resource depletion and environmental degradation. The system, with its short-termist banking, sleeping regulators and politicians who have sucked-up and basked in the glow of short-term ‘success’, allows a small number of people to take the profit whilst society pays the costs. How is continued mass consumption going to solve the problem of meeting the needs of the worlds people in a way that can be sustained Suzanne?? If consumerism helped us to live happier, healthier, fairer, greener lives I’d be all for it but the opposite is the truth!
See: http://www.buynothingday.co.uk/ and this BBC report about a local economics graduate beginning an experiment to live for a year without money:
