[MCN] Spend, baby, spend : U.S. Consumers Are the Economy's Best Hope Against Recession

[Lance Olsen]

U.S. Consumers Are the Economy's Best Hope Against Recession <https://news.google.com/articles/CAIiEKIiSgOHPLfbHGuQzrA6LGYqGQgEKhAIACoHCAow4uzwCjCF3bsCMIrOrwM?hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US%3Aen>
If the U.S. economy manages to sustain its record-breaking expansion into 2020, it will be because U.S. consumers didn't lose their nerve despite all the talk of ...
Bloomberg <https://news.google.com/publications/CAAqBwgKMOLs8Aowhd27Ag?hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US%3Aen>
5 hours ago

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Why We Should Stop Celebrating Consumerism <https://news.google.com/articles/CBMiYGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmZvcmJlcy5jb20vc2l0ZXMvam9zaHVhYmVja2VyLzIwMTkvMDkvMTcvd2h5LXdlLXNob3VsZC1zdG9wLWNlbGVicmF0aW5nLWNvbnN1bWVyaXNtL9IBZGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmZvcmJlcy5jb20vc2l0ZXMvam9zaHVhYmVja2VyLzIwMTkvMDkvMTcvd2h5LXdlLXNob3VsZC1zdG9wLWNlbGVicmF0aW5nLWNvbnN1bWVyaXNtL2FtcC8?hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US%3Aen>
Let's continue to admire success. But it is time to stop celebrating consumerism. Our society is longing for people who can tell the difference.

Forbes magazine
https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshuabecker/2019/09/17/why-we-should-stop-celebrating-consumerism/#25c3d1a142b4 <https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshuabecker/2019/09/17/why-we-should-stop-celebrating-consumerism/#25c3d1a142b4>

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The Church of Stop Shopping doesn't pull punches on its ... <https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/27/reverend-billy-church-of-stop-shopping-black-friday>
 <https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/27/reverend-billy-church-of-stop-shopping-black-friday>
Nov 27, 2015 - Reverend Billy Talen and his group are returning to New York City this Black Friday to deliver a simple message to Americans: resist consumerism

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/27/reverend-billy-church-of-stop-shopping-black-friday <https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/27/reverend-billy-church-of-stop-shopping-black-friday>

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"The big challenge is still to deliver emissions reductions at the pace and scale needed, especially in a world where economies are driven by consumption.”

Sonja van Renssen.The inconvenient truth of failed climate policies.
 
Nature Climate Change  MAY 2018  Published online: 27 April 2018 
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0155-4 <https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0155-4> 

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“What we are witnessing is a temper tantrum against the mere suggestion that there are limits to what we can consume.” 

Naomi Klein
https://theintercept.com/2019/09/15/trump-straws-plastic/ <https://theintercept.com/2019/09/15/trump-straws-plastic/>

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“Consumer expectations of ever-higher living standards were fuelled by more lenient and readily available bank lending, …. 

“Social status and identity became closely associated with consumption, in particular with the concept of luxury. 

"Identifying oneself with the good life meant being able to live beyond traditional understandings of basic needs. Debt was the price one paid for the joys of being part of a hedonistic consumer culture.”

Kenneth Dyson. The Morality of Debt. Foreign Affairs. May 3, 2015
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-05-03/morality-debt <https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-05-03/morality-debt>

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“The ecological systems upon which humans rely for life support are in crisis, 
and human behavior is the root cause.”
 
Elise Amel, Christie Manning, Britain Scott, Susan Koger

Beyond the Roots of Human Inaction. Science 21 April 2017
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/356/6335/275 <https://science.sciencemag.org/content/356/6335/275>

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“The American way of life is not negotiable.”

George H. W. Bush. 1992


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"We are not able even to think adequately about the behavior 
that is at the annihilating edge."

R. D. Laing. Introduction, The Politics of Experience. 
1967, New York. Pantheon Books, a division of Random House

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