Trash time

It’s time to talk about garbage. Why not? If you’re an average American, you produced about 4.6 pounds of it today.

To be fair, that 4.6 pounds (which, technically, was a statistic from 2006), is before some of that trash was recovered to be recycled, composted or combusted for energy. Only about 2.53 pounds per person per day goes to a landfill.

Recycling, composting and combustion weren’t so common in the past. In 1960, an average zero pounds per person per day were combusted, 0.17 were recycled and the amount composted was so negligible, the EPA didn’t even bother to put it in the report. Darn those people in 1960! We’re so much better with them with our blue bins and computer drop-offs.

Yeah. So we’re putting 2.53 pounds of garbage per person per day into the landfills. In 1960, they were putting … wait for it … 2.51 pounds of garbage in the landfills per person per day.

How? We’re recycling. We’re composting. We have that lady from Sex and the City picking up trash on the beach. How are we putting more garbage in landfills than those slobs in the Eisenhower era? (Don’t correct me. 1960 was an election year. Kennedy didn’t take office until 1961.)

Here’s how: They were throwing away less. In 2006, the average American produced 4.6 pounds of garbage each day. In 1960, that American, albeit with a different haircut, was producing 2.68 pounds per day.

Recovery recycling, combustion and composting just can’t keep up with our personal consumption.

It’s a wonderful life

Check this out. 

I’m working out the timing on an interview with the director, Brandon McCormick. I was struck by a comment he made next to the YouTube video.

“It’s less about being preachy, more about projecting myself into a farcical world.”

Isn’t the best satire not preachy?

HA!

In what has become my new favorite example of corporate culture, the domain name http://www.anticonsumerism.com/ has been registered by one of those companies that registers likely domain names in bulk and then sells it off at inflated prices to anyone interested.

HA!

In the mean time, as my planned interview fell through, here is a little more documentation of the current decline in consumer spending.

Now, last posting I talked about some numbers that freaked me out. One of them was that about 70 percent of the U.S. economy is consumer spending. I now have a few new freakout numbers.

To summarize my current freakout, the total amount of consumer debt in the U.S. is nearly $2.5 trillion. That comes to about $8,200 for every man, woman and child.

Now here’s a direct quote from the above link, just because those folks at Money-Zine put it so much better than I ever could:

“And if you’re saying to yourself – that that statistic doesn’t seem quite so bad – just keep this in mind:  We’re talking about consumer credit – which does not include debt secured by real estate.  So if you’re thinking that number has mortgage values in it, it doesn’t.”

Wow. Just, wow.

Spending down. What’s up?

If those folks at the New York Times can be trusted, personal consumption accounts for 70 percent of the economy. That freak you out? Think of it. All the business mergers, corporate purchases, billion-dollar companies buying billion-dollar companies, and so on make up less than one-third of the economy. The lion’s share is from us buying cars, boats, houses, burgers, pop, toys, aluminum siding, jewelry, video games and so on.

That was one of the two facts from this New York Times article that really weirded me out. The article’s about Americans cutting down on spending in December. One section, the one that weirded me out, dealt with why this cut in spending might not be an indicator of recession. Here’s the section, but I still recommend you read the whole article. It’s fantastic.

“Even in tough economic times Americans rarely reduce their consumption, preferring instead to slow the growth in their spending. Since 1980, they have cut spending in only five quarters — a total of 15 months — most of them in the depths of a recession. The 2001 recession passed without a cutback in consumer spending.”

So even when there’s a recession on, Americans by-and-large don’t stop buying stuff. I’m making no moral judgement here, but it’s certainly food for thought.

Hot topics

Anticonsumerism is really as broad a topic as business is, but there are several topics I plan to focus on in particular in this blog.

1. Anticonsumer efforts themselves

Did you know that Slow Down Week starts Monday? It’s an effort by the folks at anticonsumer magazine Adbusters to get people to relax and enjoy their lives for a week. It’s one of many, many things those crazy anticonsumer kids do. There are all sorts of techniques various groups use, like calling the day after Thanksgiving Buy Nothing Day, dressing up as a revivalist minister and – swear to God – dressing up as zombies and wandering around malls.

Do these techniques work? What do those involved consider their successes? And why does Adbusters have a products page?

2. Corporate policies

Last year, 23 different organizations came together with a report critiquing Wal-Mart’s loudly claimed commitment to sustainability. They allege that it’s, well, hokum. Food Wal-Mart claims is organic isn’t, the organization Wal-Mart uses to certify its seafood as sustainable accredits bad fisheries, Wal-Mart is a major seller of the cypress mulch that came from clear-cutting nature breaks against Gulf hurricanes and much, much more, the report says. It’s not all environmental critiques. For example, ”Between 1998-2003, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued at least 94 complaints against Wal-Mart, including 41 charges of illegally firing employees for union activity and 59 charges of spying on workers,” the report says.

There’s tons of that stuff out there about tons of different companies. It’ll be coming through here.

3. Policies

The business of business is tied with politics. Trade rules coming from Washington, Springfield (this blog is from Illinois) and even city hall shape how retail corporations can work. I will be keeping up on new legislation and show how the real-life influence of these seemingly abstract policy changes.

4. Moral issues of consumption

A few months and an entire lifetime ago, I was a reporter for a small newspaper in the 14th Congressional District. During the race for the seat, held most recently by former House Speaker Denny Hastert, one of the candidates was talking about the lead-based paint found in toys coming from factories in China.

“What about the kid who made the toys?” he asked.

These issues have real, moral issues tied with them. It’s time to read up on them.

Never alone

I know I’m not all that original and that’s a good thing. There’s a heck of a lot of people out there using the Internet to talk about consumerism. 

Granted, there’s a little irony there, as pointed out by this anonymous post on the Sustainable Enterprises Web site.

“If you are so anticonsumerism yourself, then where did you steal the computer that you used to make this web site? How do you get your electricity for free? Do you walk around naked? Were you home schooled? How about instead of saying anticonsumerism, we just just use the phrase responsible consumerism, then no one has to be a hipocrate.”

I just hate it when a dumb spelling error makes a pretty intelligent comment look bad.

Either way, there are a lot of people out there. And I don’t just mean the organized, official, one-way-flow-of-information Web sites linked to in the last post and now conveniently clickable on the sidebar. There are online groups like the 8,800-member Compact where people can sign on for a year of buying nothing new, get on their e-mail list or go to their blog and get involved in very interesting debates with others on the topic. There are Facebook groups, Usenet discussions, I mean, look at the blogs just on this site.

Not all of the sources are anticonsumerist, of course. Granted, the opposite of anticonsumerism is consumerism. It would be hard to link to every business and advertising firm Web site in the world. But some are directly against anticonsumerism. That link is to a Facebook group, so I copied the text below for non-members.

On the arrogant impotence of the white middle class. Buy Nothing Day does nothing whatsoever to capitalism. Culture Jamming deploys symbolism that is lost on most everyone, rendering it as effective as a corporate billboard on a culture jammer. They’ve chosen graphic designers as the vanguard of the next revolution–if we may even call it that–an elitist rearrangement of capitalism. But of course, you can’t drive away consumerism for too long with capitalism in the background. They don’t think of that because of their privilege. They stigmatize mental illness with silly metaphors that equate their latte boredom with schizophrenia. They give conservatives very good reasons to hate the left.

Pretty hardcore, huh? So, it’s a contentious topic and, if you think about these issues too, you’re not alone.

Meet and greet

Welcome to the Paulblog. Granted, it’s not called that, but that’s a pretty catchy name. I permit you to use it elsewhere.

Anyway, here’s the deal: There’s a lot of stuff we buy. You know how Christmas just ended? Probably with retailers about $475,000,000,000 richer, if the National Retail Federation is on target. And we really need very little of it. I think a lot of people would agree, but not really think that much of it. Consumerism for many people seems to be more of a storage issue than a moral issue.

There are tons of voices out there telling people to chill out on the shopping. But this blog has a different goal: To bring up the argument, not to tell you my side of it.

I like Reverend Billy. I even find some of the Adbusters prankery amusing. I like it, but I also know I like it because I happen to already agree with it. There’s nothing convincing or thought-provoking about it. It’s just people yelling to people who agree with them and at people who disagree.

Don’t get me wrong, I know that sort of activism is fun; I’ve been to college.

Person with bullhorn: “WHAT DO WE WANT?”

Everyone else in protest: Yells different thing

Person with bullhorn: “WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

Everyone else: “NOW!!!!”

So I like it. And I get it. But I also realize that a lot of the waste and a lot of the basic buy-too-much stuff comes from folks like me. We keep meaning to read a Noam Chomsky book but never get around to it and we find that, even if you capitalize it, culture jamming is just high school pranks by people with too many financial aid loans from grad school.

Sorry.

The goal here is to let people know that these issues exist and that they do affect your life, from the sweatshop-made shirt on your back to the garbage dump reek from your friendly neighborhood landfill, from the way Wal-Mart certifies its organics to Canadian-American trade rules. It’s important, I swear. Give this blog a shot and I’ll show you why.