The Epidemic Of Consumption In The 19th Century

History of Consumption
An epidemic that has greatly taken over without us even knowing about it, is still affecting lives daily and has many interesting details that have created such a unappreciated, self centered society, that has lead to compulsive spending. How did we get to such a fast growing economy that portrays us like animals fighting for a bone, with new products that trump the ones from the year before, from products that are brought over from China, Mexico, Taiwan. Brands are compared amongst ourselves and arguments arise. Along with time, we have seen changes, technological advancements that have made it easier to purchase from one's living room couch, but as a society that can never have enough, one that loves their materialistic
The working class people took this into account and did not fancy it, resulting in a striking movement. These people were seeking increases in pay, equal wages, and safer environments to work in, for a long time now and having showoffs wasn’t really helping the case. The battle for these rights went on for about 40 years and didn’t see any laws taken into account until 1938 where “The Fair Labor Standards Act made the eight-hour day and forty-hour week the law of the land” ( De Graaf et al., 127). The shifts of these laws were supposed to set us up for the greater part of life giving us more time with our families, more time to do something productive and most importantly create new jobs but now many complain about the workload they get at work, eight hour shifts now, are nothing compared to what they were back then. If we aren’t at work bringing income, there’s a great chance that we are sitting at home wasting time and money, hoping to find a new series on television to
This made families happier and even more excited to spend their hard earned money, distracting them from the fact that they worked hard for their paychecks. At the same time as all of this was going into effect, it was also creating and training a new generation of consumeristic people, that would soon be us. Now looking into modern times, we have the almighty Credit Cards, a trap created which hypnotizes not only us but teenagers that guarantee money at anytime as long as it is paid back by a certain date and with interest. The money we make is spent even more furosicolsy now that advertising has reached it’s trillion dollar industry, ads are now everywhere, from kids tv commercials to big billboards and we take the bait, our money is nowhere near secure anymore and “ By 1970, Americans were spending four times as much time shopping as were Europeans” (De Graaf et al., 136). It’s a never ending cycle until we finally realize after we are worn out that, we have no money saved and have not much to show for it which end up leading to family disputes, denial, depression,