Over-consumption: Consumer gluttony or basic requirement?

I was listening to NPR on Friday while heading out for Thanksgiving, round II and heard an interesting argument about Americans’ over-consumption and insatiable appetite for cheaply made imported goods.

Is it true that we Americans are in love with having more, more, more or is there something else going on?  The interview was with several folks, the name I remember is Sara Bongiorni, author of A Year Without “Made in China”.  Sara’s family spent a year trying to buy things that weren’t made in China and she relayed what she learned from the experience.  I can’t remember if it was Sara or another guest on the program that brought up the most interesting point for me though.  Do American’s over-consume out of greed or has over-consumption become a requirement due to the poor quality and short lifespan of the products we’ve been forced to buy?

The most applicable example for me is my cell phone.  Around 2000, I jumped in and bought my first cell phone.  For little or no money up front, I got a sturdy, reliable and simple Nokia 5100.  It had no fancy bells and whistles, but it was one durable piece of equipment.  It lasted me several years and I never had the need for another phone.  I eventually upgraded to a Sony Ericsson T610 and thats when the trouble began.  For little or no money up-front, this time I was able to get a flashy new phone that was smaller, had a camera, looked much more stylish, etc.  Since, I’ve upgraded to yet another Motorola phone.  As I’ve upgraded over the years, I’ve noticed the phones are getting poorer and poorer quality.  Yes, they are cheap, yes they are feature rich but, yes, you get what you pay for.  Buttons stop working, the shiny plastic finish starts wearing off, hinges get old and brittle, etc.  Now I’m basically in the position where I must upgrade every 18-24 months just to continue to have a functional phone.  This could be viewed as over-consumption but, in reality, its a necessity.  The stuff we buy these days just doesn’t last as long. We’re forced to overconsume.

I would love to be able to throw less away.  Throwing away something that I paid good money for upsets me.  Buying a DVD player and having it die within a few years is incredibly frusterating.  I’ve tried buying brands with higher quality such as Sony or Panasonic, but they seem equally cheap.  Is it overconsumption when I have to buy a new DVD player every few years if the old one just stops working?

We, as Americans, do consume a lot more than most countries.  We do have a lot of flashy tech gadgets and shiny chrome on our cars, but a lot of it is just a facade.  We’re spending our money and going into debt over crap.  Unfortunately, I think we’ve moved beyond a lot of it being a personal choice and being driven by greed to a point where we simply have no choice but to continue buying this cheap, low quality merchandise.  It is very difficult to find most consumer electronics for example that have any long term durability.  If given a choice, I think many Americans would spend a little more to have a nicer quality item if they thought it would last longer and not require them to throw out their current model every few years, but I don’t think those types of choices exist in most sectors. 

I’m looking into getting a new cell phone.  I don’t use the camera feature, I don’t need to be able to stream television shows, and I don’t need to have subpar MP3 capabilities built into the phone either.  Maybe its time to go back to the old Nokia…