have we really turned into a consumerism people?

photo by Markus Spiske from Unsplash

The consumerism that the world is facing today has reached very high numbers, as the average person in the u.s spends 2023 $314monthly on impulse purchases according to a study from Slickdeals

While Holiday sales have averaged an increase of 4.9% over the past 10 years, with spending in 2021 providing an unprecedented 14.1% boost in sales

And this method of consumption influenced people's tendency to buy new things and throw away the "old" even if it could be repaired. For example, I have my iPhone 6 for nearly 6 years, and I'm happy with it, but everyone I meet wonders why I have it. For this phone until today and why I did not change it

As most of us are probably stuck today in some bad shopping habits that are difficult to get rid of, there is a special pleasure that drives you to shop, from colors to different patterns, and multiple styles, all this pushes you to buy more, and sometimes shopping is a psychological relief to escape from a problem you face And sometimes it is for the sake of social affiliation and being affected by what others acquire, while others see its social value on the basis of what it owns of new expensive things in order to show off in front of others, turning into a desperate attempt to appease people and obtain acceptance without knowing the reason for that sometimes.

But the problem with this behavior lies when the entire global system works in the same way, as consumerism has helped convince people that your use of something for months or perhaps a year has become obsolete and should be replaced with new copies, which led to our consumption of many things that we do not need, and The question becomes from what is the extent of my need to buy to when to buy, and as a result, our homes are filled with many clothes and things that are many times more than our need.

perhaps The most prominent explanation for our excessive consumption is the amount of waste in the world, as the increasing demand, results in huge amounts of waste and environmental pollutants that the Earth's ecosystems are unable to bear.

photo by Vivianne Lemay from Unsplash

So what made the world in the last years dedicated to purchasing?

It was certain after the industrial revolution that took place in the nineteenth century that the world had a date with a new world order that would change the economic trend and the way the world works. It is called multinational companies, but in order for these companies to succeed, they need to influence consumer behavior through one solution, which is advertising

advertisement basically aims to export a certain view allowing a deep desire to imitate what others buy and continuously purchase until it overwhelmed emotional behaviors, and enhanced desires and interest in secondary matters

and For years, companies have studied intensively how to promote the product, and consumer patterns, understand their needs, influence the audience and create endless new needs, by influencing emotional desires, and how to keep the product in a continuous cycle of consumption so that consumption becomes a goal in itself. , to continue buying and to ensure an increase in its profits

a study by the National Academy of Sciences in the United States showed the ability of Facebook to influence people's moods in precise ways that are predicted by putting certain words in the posts they see.

While the United States comes as the country most affected by spending in the world, the godfather of advertising, as it reached the highest country in the world in consumer spending, possessing the largest consumer markets in the world, as spending represents more than two-thirds of economic activity

As market commodities dominated American life over the past hundred years, and humans became consumers long before World War I, but consumer culture became popular in America in the 1920s, with the opening of markets for industrial and technological progress and product diversity, and from America to countries the world led to the spread of today's consumer culture

photo by Kevin Rajaram from Unsplash

In my opinion, several factors related to each other affect the individual in addition to the effect that advertisements produce, such as living in an environment that stimulates consumption and linking the concept of wealth with the ability to consume and not just owning money. The individual is constantly looking for material needs that he desires and may not be able to reach.

Another catalyst for this increase is social media, there are three billion people around the world who use social networking sites, which is equivalent to 40 percent of the world's population. An average adult spends browsing and interacting with social networking sites about two hours per day

Perhaps many do not find the time and money for these matters, but, because we live within the society we are certainly affected by everything we see and hear, theoretically, in my opinion, there are two main factors related to each other that affect the individual in addition to other factors, namely the development of technological life and the tyranny of consumer markets (capitalism) and living in a stimulating environment  For consumption and linking the concept of wealth with the ability to consume and not just owning money so that it made the individual constantly seek material needs that he desires and may not be able to reach.

the other helping factor in this increase is social media, There are three billion people around the world using social networking sites, equivalent to 40 percent of the world's population.  We also spend an average of about two hours a day browsing and interacting with these sites

As the number of users of these platforms reached nearly half of our planet’s population (3.5 billion people, equivalent to 45% of the Earth’s population) at an average of 3 hours per day.

and the emergence of influencers helped promote more consumption, because of the image that these people give of their extravagant lives full of pleasure and excitement in traveling and buying clothes from well-known companies on an ongoing basis, and in the acquisition of furniture and household antiques,

after The spread of online shopping and the use of credit cards made it easy to do a purchase with one click of a button, and this ease and speed made us shop without noticing what we spend.

and online purchases doubled, achieving unprecedented growth in online shopping during the pandemic

Online sales of consumer goods are expected to grow 163 percent by 2023 across major markets, according to a new report from research organization IGD, in partnership with The Consumer Goods Forum.

Before studying media, it never occurred to me how a simple advertisement that we pass in front of us on public streets can affect our behavior in the buying process. A few seconds can plant an idea in your subconscious mind and make us take behavior that you may not be aware of.

so It is important to pay attention to what we see daily on social media and what we feed ourselves because it will certainly fall within our convictions and priorities of our interests, whether we accept them or not.