How consumerism shaped America

Americans buy a lot of stuff… like a lot, a lot. According to The Wall Street Journal, Americans spend 1.2 billion dollars on nonessential products each year. The buying of goods is heavily promoted within our society, whether it be in pop-up internet ads, sent in the mail, or from the mouth of the salesman himself. This idea, known as consumerism, implies that continually increasing the amount of goods being bought is desirable both economically and socially, according to an entry by Merriam-Webster. Though consumerism has existed in some facet since the birth of the United States’ economy, the concept rapidly evolved in the US during the twentieth century, eventually becoming what we know it as today. 

In the 1920s, the idea of credit—buying now and payer later—was widely popularized across the country. Now, middle-class families could afford luxuries, such as cars and vacuum cleaners, that were previously only accessible to the rich, according to an article by pbs.org. With much larger groups of people stimulating the economy in this way, business boomed. The use of advertisement and promotion of consumer goods skyrocketed, encouraging citizens more than ever to buy, buy, buy. Historian Lizabeth Cohen theorized that this encouragement occurred to such an extent that being a devoted, upstanding buyer soon became synonymous with being a devoted, upstanding citizen. 

photo by leyla dumke

During this time, production in the United States increased a staggering amount. In BBC article “How the World Embraced Consumerism”, writer Kerryn Higgs explained, “US production was more than 12 times greater in 1920 than in 1860, while the population over the same period had only increased by a factor of three.” With an exponentially increasing amount of stuff and an economy dependent on the general populace buying it, it was inevitable that the country would shift further and further toward a culture of excessive buying. 

This mounting change continued until the effects of the Great Depression set in. Even so, the post-World War II economic boom reignited the consumer culture started in the 20s, Professor Halina Szejnwald Brown, writer for The Conversation, explained. With a period of over 60 years with no major economic recessions, the economy on the mend—and the re-emerging trend of consumerism—steadily grew through the rest of the twentieth century, ebbing and flowing with the trends of the decades. 

Near the turn of the century, major technological innovation became a catalyst for the ever-growing consumer culture the country had firmly adopted. With the implementation of the internet, smartphones, and social media, consumerism adapted to the digital age. This modern form of consumerism emerged, while still retaining the same ideals first brought to life in the 1920s.