Consumerism And Why Is It Important To American Consumers

You may ask what consumerism is and why is it important to American consumer? First off consumerism is defined as the fact or practice of an increasing consumption of goods. This is the act of buying and selling of goods and services whether you need them or not. Every time the public turn on the TV the radio, or go for a drive in their car they are witnessing this. This has become the social norm and most of the time the public don’t know this is happening. Now why is this important to the general public? The American consumer need to be aware of the ideas that are being feed to them and driving their life and choices. On the other hand all of this is not a bad thing it’s gives them drive to better their life and provide the necessary needs for their loved ones. “Our daily lives driven by Consumerism”
Buy buy buy, if the consumers wants a status level they are told what to buy to get that status.
Veblen called this “conspicuous consumption-the desire to demonstrate one’s prestige and status based on one’s material acquisitions”. By the consumer trying to keep up with the Jones this leads to needless spending on items and services that the consumer doesn’t really need. This covers all aspects of the general public’s life they are told what to drive, what to wear, what to eat, and where to live. With all these ideas being forced down the consumer’s throat it makes it hard for some consumers to remain true to their self and live within their means. This can result in bankruptcies, maxed credit cards, poor credit, and overdue bills. This all adds onto the stress level of the American public’s already crazy, always on the go life. It’s ok to buy the things we want if we can do it while living within our means. If the consumer has to start maxing their credit cards and going in bankruptcy to obtain these items then we are
wrong.
Now on the flip side of this Americans are told to go to school, to get a better job, to make more money, to buy more things. This is where the good comes into account as long as Americans can maintain true to their values and beliefs, Americans can use this as are driving force. Education is very important to us all and we are told this from a young age by our parent, teachers and all different types of advertisements. Go to school get good grades, so you can get into college, do well in college so that you can get a degree and get a good job. At work we are told to go above and beyond to get a promotion to make more money. We need to set a limit on when enough is enough. Once we are at the point where we can provide the necessities of daily living and a little bit of fun that is the point where we need to spot. The driving force to go to school and get a good job is a good thing, as long as it doesn’t get out of control. The want to have nice things is also not a bad thing. Anymore then this is going to start costing Americans time, a resource that no matter what we do we cannot get back. Just like we are told everything in moderation.

The good, consumerism also is a consent drive to push ourselves to go to school and get a good job and make good money. As long as this does not start costing us to much time The bad, living outside our means “buying things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people we don’t like. Keep true to ourselves and only get the things that we need and not what others tell us we need. The ugly, from all this buying to achieve a certain status. 936,795 Americans filled some sort of bankruptcy in 2014 In closing we need to learn to live within our means, if our means are not enough, find a way to improve them but never do this at the cost of time that we can never get back.