Am I old-fashioned if I don’t criticize the Chinese thriftiness, as US Treasury Secretary Paulson has done? If I agree with the part of Chinese population who regards spending heaps of money for consumerism’s sake as an “unnecessary waste” (1), do I risk appearing too leftist?
A survey conducted by HSBC and reported by Peter Wong in Time magazine shows how, inevitably, the Chinese middle-class is adapting to Western standards of spending. As Wong explains, “the emerging middle-class has become an important target market for international business keen to supply it with product and services.”
Yes, I acknowledge that consumption is a key element within the virtuous cycle of a country’s GDP growth. I’m also well aware that the soaring trade deficit with the US is a sufficient reason for American businesses to urge Chinese consumers to increase spending.
Even so, I can’t help considering the very principles of consumerism fallacious. I still find that pushing people towards buying by creating induced needs is basically wrong. I’m not so naïve as to believe that communist utopias where everybody has the same and therefore has no need to own more, is a feasible project. Nor that it works. But I am against a foolish consumerism without limits, that leads people to want more and more.
This is the dominating Western mentality being exported to the East. However, according to Wong, the Chinese middle-class is not yet as “profligate” as the American one “whose saving rate is zero.” Chinese are exposed to unbridled consumerism models, but are still “value conscious.”
Yet, I suppose it’s only a matter of time. How long will it take for the Chinese to become like us?
References
(1) Time, “Raiding the piggy bank”- March 5th 2007 (p.38)
Down with Western consumerism March 5, 2007
Posted by japanesemaple in comment posts.add a comment
Am I old-fashioned if I don’t criticize the Chinese thriftiness, as US Treasury Secretary Paulson has done? If I agree with the part of Chinese population who regards spending heaps of money for consumerism’s sake as an “unnecessary waste” (1), do I risk appearing too leftist?
A survey conducted by HSBC and reported by Peter Wong in Time magazine shows how, inevitably, the Chinese middle-class is adapting to Western standards of spending. As Wong explains, “the emerging middle-class has become an important target market for international business keen to supply it with product and services.”
Yes, I acknowledge that consumption is a key element within the virtuous cycle of a country’s GDP growth. I’m also well aware that the soaring trade deficit with the US is a sufficient reason for American businesses to urge Chinese consumers to increase spending.
Even so, I can’t help considering the very principles of consumerism fallacious. I still find that pushing people towards buying by creating induced needs is basically wrong. I’m not so naïve as to believe that communist utopias where everybody has the same and therefore has no need to own more, is a feasible project. Nor that it works. But I am against a foolish consumerism without limits, that leads people to want more and more.
This is the dominating Western mentality being exported to the East. However, according to Wong, the Chinese middle-class is not yet as “profligate” as the American one “whose saving rate is zero.” Chinese are exposed to unbridled consumerism models, but are still “value conscious.”
Yet, I suppose it’s only a matter of time. How long will it take for the Chinese to become like us?
References
(1) Time, “Raiding the piggy bank”- March 5th 2007 (p.38)