Consumerism And Environment

Decent Essays
With about 1.7 billion people in the consumer class, the damage of overconsumption in developed countries, greatly impacts the environment. Consumerism in the U.S. is responsible for the depletion of 20% of the world’s resources, and 50% of it’s waste. But, just as capitalism spreads in developing countries, consumer culture spreads with it. This growing appetite makes the needs of the poor harder to reach, while constantly contributing to environmental issues. According to the UN human development report in 1998, “runaway growth in consumption in the past fifty years is putting strains on the environment never before seen.” With this rampant destruction of our environment, we must as consumers, ask ourselves how we can become informed, stop …show more content…
Many may argue that the root of modern consumerism, that is, the explosion and spread of wealth, has benefited the poor; with the sharing of wealth and the advancement of the middle class’s freedom to contribute greatly to modern society. The greatest strides in technology development has been a result of widespread consumerism, such as the steam engine, the assembly line, wide literacy, modern university, the elevator, cars, plastic, the women 's movement, and more. While these are all great outcomes, they are second to the fact that consumerism, is vital for the economy, and is based on the presumption that the economy will keep growing, which is not the case. The growth of the economy is reflected in the production and consumption of the products produced, consumerism provides employment, and a mass market that improves the lifestyles of consumers. The economy has come to a point with consumerism, where reduction or modification would be destabilizing. Regardless of the many negative aspects of consumerism, there may be found a few virtues, however it is up to individuals to decide for themselves if it is worth the debt, greed, and environmental …show more content…
The most important part of getting conservation started is educating the public about this serious problem, and to what extent we have impacted the environment and society. Now as americans, we don’t have the right to tell other countries that they should change before we do, we should set an example for them to follow. Even if other countries wouldn’t pay attention to the example we would set, there wouldn’t be too much of a loss, considering how much of our footprint we would be cutting out. Some could argue that it the costs to fix the problem is to much, but what alternative do we have? Are we just going to let generations to come suffer with the mistakes we have made? No, we shouldn’t, because the cost of saving the environment will be worth it, especially if we start now, and actually acknowledge the problems that we have

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