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We live in a 'throwaway society,' which is a term used to characterize a society driven by materialism. What strategies can be used to address the problem of our 'throwaway society'?
The throw-away society is a generalized description of a human social concept strongly influenced by consumerism, whereby the society tends to use items once only, from disposable packaging, and consumer products are not designed for reuse or lifetime use.
Politicians in less economically developed countries are under pressure to establish and maintain a stable and expanding economy for the country to increase its wealth sustainably, according to the political elements and issues of throwaway society. To do this, citizens and tourists must purchase goods for money to flow into the system; consequently, these politicians must support consumerism to complete their work successfully. Sian Berry and Jonathan Bartley, co-leaders of the Green Party, signed the Manchester Declaration, which calls for customers to have the 'right to repair.' Other politicians who have signed the declaration include Labour MP Fleur Anderson, Conservative MP Robert Goodwill, and former Liberal Democrat leader Vince Cable. As customers, we should have the right to goods that are built to last and designed to be repairable if something breaks. There is no technical reason why this should not be the case; it is businesses aiming to maximize profits to increase sales that are exploiting people and destroying the environment. Political leaders such as Sian Berry and Jonathan Bartley are utilizing their political influence at the municipal, national, and European levels to push for a circular economy and the right to repair. The development of products that will fail or become less desirable over time is known as planned obsolescence, and it encourages consumers to throw away their old products and replace them with new ones. It encourages consumers to buy more and saves businesses money by reducing the need to invest in higher-quality products. Technology or car firms producing new products each year with only minimal changes are examples of planned obsolescence. Consumers or the environment do not profit from planned obsolescence. It simply improves the profitability of corporations and businesses.
Consumerism is the idea that increasing the consumption of goods and services purchased in the market is always a desirable goal and that a person's well-being and happiness depend fundamentally on obtaining consumer goods and material possessions. Consumerism helps economic growth by persuading people to buy more products they think they want through various forms of advertising, which affects the majority of people, resulting in more money being spent, which means more money is put back into circulation, resulting in economic growth for both the country and the business. However, the way our economy consumes resources is not sustainable. A 'linear' approach - where materials are extracted, made into a product, used, and discarded - wastes valuable resources and damages the environment. Furthermore, increasing levels of consumption in developing countries will put further pressure on the prices of materials and, as a result, company and consumer costs. It makes environmental and economic sense to take a 'circular' approach to reusing resources and maximizing their value over time, and there are potentially billions of pounds in benefits for businesses across the economy by becoming more efficient.
Consumerism has the greatest impact on society because it is to people within it that products are advertised; in fact, people are the real product being persuaded for their money. Due to various reasons such as fast food, clothing, holidays, vehicles, and technology, the money output of society has increased since the implementation of consumerism. However, with more money being put back into the country, the more money there is for technological research resulting in a higher demand for new technology being implemented into everyday life.
The environmental factor of consumerism is that as technology advances, the physical environment will change. For example, new construction methods will be developed, resulting in new building structures. Then there's the social environment, which will alter as people become more habituated to consumerism in the future years and will continue to do so until a social intervention.
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