Dr. Martin Hash Podcast

After that first bit of necessary consumption: food, shelter, protection; being a consumer is actually empowering. Buying things puts control into the hands of the purchaser. For some people, this is a proactive way they can position themselves in the dominance hierarchy, which is why the thing they buy is not nearly as important as being the one making decisions and ordering around the staff. For example, shoes are very personal, almost unique to the individual, have lots and lots of varieties, are relatively cheap, require an attendant, and makes the consumer happy, which makes purchasing shoes the ideal example of consumerism, but how many pairs of shoes does one person need?

Consumers also find cohesiveness in the things they buy since the places they shop at, limit what they can purchase to what the majority of people want. This is a very subtle but powerful way to create a cultural cohesion because a nation is what it consumes, which makes the backlash against consumerism very concerning; yes, people can live in the forest, wearing only a loincloth and eating twigs & leafs, but that's on the wrong end of the spectrum of the goal of only working 3-hours a week. Tarzan's opportunities for self-improvement are severely limited compared to George Jetson's.