This has been nagging me.

[jackshoegazer]

So, the numbers show that The United States of America is about 4% of the world's population, but that we consume 25% of the world's resources.  The implications of this are quite simple - we are stealing from the rest of the world to satisfy our consumer culture.  If the rest of the world were to live like middle class Americans, we would burn through this planet in what, maybe 20 years?  No usable water, no minerals, no petroleum, pollution so bad that growing food is all but impossible?

This leaves us with a bit of a conundrum.  Obviously the rest of the world can not attain what we expect as a standard of living.  But who here is willing to drop your standard of living to match closer to what the majority of the world has?  Yeah, I didn't think so.

We can see hints of this most prominently in the labor markets.  With labor markets becoming more global, we have seem wages in America drop (no real growth in over 30 years - in fact, adjusted for inflation, wages have dropped - thus prices for things have gone up 8 to 15 times in the last 30 years  but we're actually making LESS money.)  As more and more corporations move jobs overseas where there is an abundance of cheap labor, labor prices world-wide will drop and the more this happens, the lower wages will go.  Eventually, when wages hit a worldwide equilibrium point, the average wage will be what, maybe $1-to-2 per hour?  If we're lucky?  Do we all move into corporate barracks and shantytowns?

So where do we go?  How do we continue to justify our lifestyle when it becomes so absolutely apparent that it is unsustainable and immoral?  Obviously, this is a long-range problem with way too many factors to dive into in this little blog post, but really, think about it.  Think about a global averaging of lifestyle.  Without major advances in technology (specifically with efficiency and the environmental/sustainable aspects) things look very bleak indeed.

It was often said that the GenXers were going to be the first generation of Americans who could expect to have a standard of living lower than their parents, but that never really materialized.  However, in the relatively near future, we can absolutely expect that to happen.  And not just a little lower, but full-on, major degradations of living standards.  I know I'm taking the long view on this, but shit this nags the hell out of me.

Comments

[gislebertus.livejournal.com]

I'd be interested to know how much we produce vis-a-vis consume, because theoretically, if everyone was going to pull their own weight, we'd not only consume 4%, we'd produce 4% as well. I think the major question here isn't us stealing from the rest of the world as much as us needing to balance our production and consumption.

[joraina.livejournal.com]

The recession is rather like an experiment to frugality. Nobody is happy about it, but people are being forced to live with less. Or, they are refusing to live with less and falling into even greater debt. (Of course, I am referencing only a single segment of the population.)

I absolutely find it impossible to predict what will happen in the future. I am idealistic and imagine that people sway towards equilibrium, such that progress is linear. Yet, I also know that the logic that ought to be is not, and that our world, and this nation, are both fucked up. Oh well. These next few decades will certainly be an interesting journey.

[hellocthulhu.livejournal.com]

The rise in availability of consumer credit has kept many people blind to the fact that their income is falling. I think that, in the aftermath of the recession, a lot of people are going to wake up to this.

I'm nagged by this too... I'm keenly aware that companies bringing jobs to impoverished nations is critical to raising the standard of living there... yet I also rail savagely against companies that offshore jobs from America and leave workers here high and dry.

I think that the rivets are rusting out of the ship of our civilization. I think we've hit the wall where large-scale private capitalism is now longer sustainable. There's only so many jobs you can offshore to keep prices down before no one will be able to afford your goods back home, at any price. Also, let's face it, the job pool is shrinking. Manufacturing is heavily automated, and low-level service industries are headed in that direction. I don't think population reduction will fix this, because reducing the number of people will also reduce demands for goods and services, shrinking the job pool more. We need to manifest the social will to demand changes to capitalism.

I firmly believe that we could manage our resources in a way that could detach standard of living from employment and move towards equalization. It just calls for a mindshift change.

[labelle77.livejournal.com]

Hear, hear. and this why i've been working in the last fiveish years to reduce my consumption bit by bit, learn to live on local, learn survivalist techniques, and learn to live in small spaces. doin' the bohemian thing, because the sooner i learn how to do it successfully and happily the better off I'll be. i've also simultaneously cultivated a disgust for conspicuous consumption - i didn't really mean to, but as i saw how unnecessary most of our "stuff" is to a person's life, i can't help but see a lot of things as tragically wasteful.

[balamuthia.livejournal.com]

It was often said that the GenXers were going to be the first generation of Americans who could expect to have a standard of living lower than their parents

I certainly hope there's a steady decline in standard of living. My family live with one television, no car, no game console, I'm still using my Rebel XT and a $30 Holga to take images that are getting into galleries, and we live (a family of three) well on less than 32K a year by upcycling, thrift store shopping, and using some conscientiousness and forethought with regard to food shopping.

I think the things people in this country think they "need" are abhorrent sometimes. It nags at me too, I guess is what I'm saying.

[color-me-awake.livejournal.com]

I agree completely.
Very eloquently put.

[autumnhawk.livejournal.com]

I think you've got it right here. We can't justify our American lifestyle, and yet not enough people are going to drop out willingly. Frankly, I'm not too sad that globalization is going to even out the playing field eventually. I only hope enough people can get involved in shepherding that process so that it can involve making the more world more just instead of just crappier.

The thing is we still need to raise the standard of living in large portions of the globe. I think the more we concentrated on that as a society the easier it would be to let go of some of what we have.