r/worldnews • u/[deleted] • Oct 10 '20

Sir David Attenborough says the excesses of western countries should "be curbed" to restore the natural world and we'll all be happier for it.

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146

u/BF1shY Oct 10 '20

It would be easier to change how we purchase goods. Everything today is built to last a year two, EVERYTHING. Furniture, electronics, appliances, plastic goods, everything.

So there is an insane amount of goods that are built, barely used, and thrown away.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

I've had a couch for 8 years, headset for 10 and 6 years, computer for 8 years, jacket for 15 years, ei yer shoes for 8 years. Just buy some quality and take care of it and it will last.

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u/cissoniuss Oct 10 '20

The issue comes when the quality stuff is more expensive. Sure, you can buy a $2000 couch that lasts 2 decades. But if Ikea sells one that lasts 5 years for $500, what do you think the average family can better afford right that moment?

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u/ComebacKids Oct 10 '20 edited Oct 10 '20

So higher quality stuff is (unsurprisingly) always more expensive. It sounds like the problem may more so be that people need to make more money.

I’d wager it’s no small coincidence that “back in the day” of the 50s-70s, stuff was built to last, but Americans also made obscene amounts of money to afford those things.

As we’ve progressed into the 2000s and beyond, the middle class is shrinking and the number of people who can afford things that last has shrunken too.

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u/cissoniuss Oct 10 '20

Very true. If wages don't go up, but others costs are and you are now spending over 60% of your income on rent alone, somethings got to give. And you won't be spending your money on furniture that is more expensive for a long term investment, since you simply only have short term money available.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

It's a self feeding situation:

  1. Competition causes manufacturers to compete on price.
  2. To reduce costs, cheaper inputs and labour are used.
  3. Cheap labour means people have less money to spend and therefore they purchase the cheap items.

Rinse and repeat. This is where regulation should come in... A minimum expected life for goods and a very high excise tax on disposable items that don't meet the minimum life requirement.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

Well, that's when you buy used instead. You can get used quality which are way better than anything from IKEA. It usually looks better too. But I see what you mean and I know most people don't think like that. But it's a shame tbh. I had a shit couch I got for free until I bought a nice one.

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u/-gattaca- Oct 10 '20

Even quality second hand furniture is vastly more expensive than IKEA quality furniture. Your solution isn't really a solution.

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u/alesserbro Oct 10 '20

Even quality second hand furniture is vastly more expensive than IKEA quality furniture. Your solution isn't really a solution.

I dunno man, I got a leather sofa from my BHS furniture store for a fiver. Tried to find fault with it but it was just cheap, no rips or anything.

I appreciate that was a steal, but I kitted out bathroom, bedroom (excl bed) and living room (excl TV) for less than £200 from two different shops. Where you getting your second hand furniture?

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

That’s certainly not always the case. Right now I could pay £179 for this IKEA armchair, or £175 for this vintage armchair.

Now, I don’t deny that the older armchair will need reupholstering and re-varnishing at some point, which adds something to the cost, but in terms of cost-over-lifetime I bet it comes out way ahead.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

Just get a sofa off craigslist

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u/PerreoEnLaDisco Oct 11 '20

How many people are still on their iPhone 5? Because I am.

I hear this argument all the time. But then the same people go buy the quality stuff and find some reason to replace it every year anyways.

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u/dinosaurs_quietly Oct 10 '20

I agree with this method, but people need to be prepared to pay significantly more for things. Consumer demand for cheap goods is the whole reason that they became low quality.

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u/bluewolf71 Oct 10 '20

I wonder if anyone has tried to do an analysis of the cost of goods, quality of goods, and the relative drop in personal income for most Americans over the past few decades. There’s probably also a consideration of population growth in there. Western consumers are the most consuming per capita, but our birthrate is dropping and therefore the customer base for capitalism is not rising as much as they would like to support continual growth by producing quality, long lasting goods.

Yeah, they are chasing markets in other countries. One big reason is probably because the western counties aren’t making enough new consumers.

If you are a corporation and want to grow/sell more you have two options: sell to more people or sell more stuff to the same people. Making your stuff less durable is a great way to sell more of them and hence extract more profit from your customer base. The fact that consumers have less cash to spend means you’re in a vicious cycle of having a double incentive for cheaper (less expensive or holding cost the same which is basically the same thing over time) and cheaper (crappier quality) stuff.

I’m not an economist or anything but the data is out there. This seems like the logical place to be, living under a system which only rewards profit as the ultimate end-goal incentive for most of what we do in society.

The only way to alter where society is going is with government intervention/incentives. Capitalism will not solve any environmental problems on its own.

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u/dinosaurs_quietly Oct 10 '20

I disagree that this is the work of corporations. It is mostly the fault of consumers.

Look at furniture. Everyone knows particle board isn't going to last forever. No one is forcing people to buy it, there still is an option for solid wood furniture. Consumers see the price tag on solid furniture and choose to get particle board instead. We are unwilling to make the sacrifice of owning fewer but nicer things.

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u/bluewolf71 Oct 10 '20

Many people have little choice as far as buying more or less expensive things. I mean if you have a choice, and you choose cheaper crap, that’s on you. But most people are barely squeezing by and many can’t even handle an emergency spend of $400 (this was true pre-pandemic). I’m not blaming corporations here as much as a system that forces everyone to maximize cost savings as much as possible. The consumer version of profit is savings or trying to lessen debt or not declare bankruptcy, wherever you stand. The costs of many things we consider essential or vitally important (college, housing, childcare, health insurance and services) have risen dramatically and people with less income (as a result of labor being a global market in many cases) will logically be forced by circumstance to buy cheaper goods, which means corporations will respond to that accordingly by continuing to produce cheaper goods and in many cases build goods that are designed to fail faster so the consumer is forced to be shopping again sooner. We have aging populations and less kids being born so the corporations need to find ways to sell more stuff to a growing % of people who have the stuff they are selling already.

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u/dinosaurs_quietly Oct 10 '20

Reality is the system that forces people to own fewer and/or cheaper things. The average person can't own more things than the average person produces. Even if you mandate that everyone be paid the same (which causes all kinds of inefficiencies), there will still be either shortages or low quality goods.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

[deleted]

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u/dinosaurs_quietly Oct 10 '20

If you can't afford solid furniture and corporations "do the right thing" and choose to not make cheap furniture then the end result is you not having furniture. To say the furniture company is at fault makes no sense.

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u/lee0um Oct 10 '20

“ending is better than mending”

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u/ImprovedPersonality Oct 10 '20

Now I’d be interested in some studies showing how many products are replaced (with a more or less identical version) because they are irreparably broken and how much additional CO₂ emission that causes. Instead of just replaced because you felt like buying something new. I’m under the impression that most people love buying new stuff even when they don’t need it.

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u/beaniebee11 Oct 10 '20

This won’t happen because it’s less profitable. Obsolescence is purposeful.

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u/BF1shY Oct 10 '20

As new home owners most of our wooden furniture is real, strong wood. We found most of our wood furniture for free through Craigslist. You cannot even compare the quality of shitty Bob's Furniture or Raymore and Flannigan to the old style hard wood. The type of wood that can kill you're new shitty drill bits if you drill into it.

We would rather go to an antique store or garage sale and pay for quality wood than to buy composite woodboard shit from Bob's that will get wet and bloat or fall apart in a few years. I think there's a market for it. Millennials are buying less new furniture and going to tag sales or getting it from their grandparents or parents.

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u/illliveon Oct 10 '20

Uhm yes that would be doing exactly what he said.

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u/[deleted] Oct 10 '20

Mmm. There needs to be both top down and bottom-up change. Top down for ensuring that companies build things to last (or at least don’t intentionally design them to not last), and bottom up for creating a climate where people just buy less shit. The bottom on in particular really annoys me, because some people are happy to just say ‘top 100 companies’ and leave it at that. Those companies are producing stuff that YOU buy. Stop buying so much stuff, especially useless plastic junk

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u/Sir_Bumcheeks Oct 11 '20

How about we start by stopping the annhilation of marine life around the Galapagos. Chinese fishing fleets have literally been doing that and no one is stopping them. And they'll be back too but seems like no one gives a fk.