Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
$1.2 trillion: How much Americans spend annually on goods and services they don’t absolutely need.
This Easter weekend, Americans will spend a lot of money on items such as marshmallow peeps, plush bunnies and fake hay, begging a question: How much does the U.S. economy depend on purchases of goods and services people don’t absolutely need?
As it turns out, quite a lot. A non-scientific study of Commerce Department data suggests that in February, U.S. consumers spent an annualized $1.2 trillion on non-essential stuff including pleasure boats, jewelry, booze, gambling and candy. That’s 11.2% of total consumer spending, up from 9.3% a decade earlier and only 4% in 1959, adjusted for inflation. In February, spending on non-essential stuff was up an inflation-adjusted 3.3% from a year earlier, compared to 2.4% for essential stuff such as food, housing and medicine.
I've been wondering that myself. Especially since Tuesday, when I got this phone call:
“Could you come down here, to the office?” the man asked. “We need to take another imprint of your credit card.”
For years – maybe a decade – I’ve rented a small storage space a kilometer or two from my house. Everything I don’t need but can’t part with – old manuscripts, financial records, a couple of sofas, a large collection of vinyl records – got tossed into the back of the car, driven to the storage facility, and stacked tightly in a small square of windowless concrete. I’d shove it all in, drag down the rolling metal door, and secure it all with a padlock. The privilege of storing a lot of meaningless junk in an inaccessible place didn’t come cheap: I was billed, monthly, on my credit card, about two hundred dollars a month.
I know, I know. And I agree with you: I’m a fool.
On an intellectual level, of course, I know that every single item in that storage cell is utterly valueless, to me or anyone. And I’m aware that federal tax regulations only require paper receipts for the past three years; that my entire music collection now fits snugly on a hard drive the size of a paperback book; that the posters and prints I enjoyed in college, twenty years ago, are so yellowed and frayed that unrolling them would turn them into dust; that, finally, I no longer need the futon because I’m in my forties, and my friends are in their forties, and futons are incompatible with forty year-old backs and necks.
But for some reason, my default behavior was, send it to storage.
I’m not alone. The self-storage industry in America is booming. One in ten American families, according to a recent survey, rent some kind of extra storage space. Odd statistic that, because for the past thirty years, the average American home has gotten larger and more spacious while the average American family has been shrinking. Apparently, we’ve been living in larger houses with fewer people, but we still don’t have enough room for our junk.
The appeal of the storage facility is that it allows you to put off making the tough decisions – do I need this “Dexy’s Midnight Runners” record? Am I ever going to ride this stationary bike again? Where did I pick up this ridiculous halogen lamp? – and instead, send everything to the limbo of the storage facility, where it waits in lonely, dusty silence to be useful again, to be remembered and needed.
But nobody needs 1996’s tax records, and certainly not for two hundred dollars a month, so when the manager of the storage facility called me about my credit card – apparently they needed to photocopy the new version of the card, with the new expiry date, because that’s how long I’d been renting from them – a halogen-bright light went off in my head. I knew what I needed to do.
Dump it all.
“So what happens,” I asked the manager, “if I just stop paying?”
There was a pause on the other side of the line.
“Well,” he said, “then we take possession of what’s in there and we auction it off.”
I actually knew this. There is, in fact, a reality television show about this very phenomenon – proof that there’s a reality television show about everything – and it’s a pretty interesting show. Storage facilities like the one I rent from often have renters simply stop paying – the credit card expires or is denied, phone calls go unanswered, and so the contents are auctioned off to a bunch of professional scavengers, who bid on the entire bundle after being given a short, no-touching-allowed glimpse of the concrete box.
It’s called “Auction Hunters,” and occasionally a lucky bidder will find rare art or gold coins buried in the mound of personal junk, but mostly it’s stuff like mine: exercycles and a copy of “Come On Eileen.”
“You don’t want to do that,” the manager said. “You don’t want strangers pawing through your special things.”
“If they were special I wouldn’t let them hang out in a small concrete box,” I said, but I knew he was right. The proper thing to do is to drive over there, load up the back of the car, and take the stuff to some kind of charity, or, failing that, some kind of junk heap. The thing to avoid, of course, is any kind of detour back to the house, where I’ll be tempted to sort through the pile, looking for odds and ends to save.
“Do not go shopping through your own junk,” a friend of mine warned me when I told him the plan. “My wife does that and it drives me crazy. We still have the charger for a Sonicare toothbrush they haven’t made since 2003. Do yourself a favor: take it straight to the dump.”
So I’ve prepared myself for the complete emptying of my storage unit, the de-accessioning of a lifetime’s worth of vinyl, bad art, free weights, and multi-purpose furniture. It’s happening Saturday morning. I’ve made up my mind.
“Okay,” the manager said when I told him I’d be by to empty out my box. “I’ll be here.”
And I detected the slight, smug tone of a man who’s heard this before, from folks who suddenly realized that they’re throwing away good money to keep bad stuff, and who make a plan to rid themselves, once and for all, of the things they don’t need. Still, somehow businesses like his keep making money. Somehow, despite larger houses with fewer inhabitants, there’s something compelling about the idea of keeping everything, just in case.
I did actually love that old song, “Come On Eileen.” And maybe I’ll start using that exercise bike. You never know.
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Comments:
Jan '11
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Just before the 2008 bubble burst, I would get stickers and flyers from companies that would drop big bins in your driveway, which they would subsequently haul to the dump full of your meaningless and undesirable possessions. It was at that point I realized that we were in for a messy future.
Furniture has changed, for example. In our family, it was handed down through generations. Now, I can buy an IKEA table to $35, and if I get tired of it, I can just chop it up and throw it in the fireplace.
Dec '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Rob -
Thanks for your interesting piece that reminded me of the book co-authored by Vicki Robin, Joe Dominguez and Monique Tilford entitled "Your Money or Your Life" that emphasized saving as opposed to spending money on "stuff." Didn't agree with all of it, bt found it compelling. I find it interesting that we live half our life aquiring "stuff" and the other half getting rid of it. I'm also reminded of the late George Carlin's comic routine on "stuff"
Mar '11
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
I bet you and Henry David Thoreau would never reach a philosophical agreement on stuff.....
Oct '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Set yourself free. Simply donate or dump all the excess baggage.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
1. Thanks for the earworm of "Come on Eileen."
2. Freecycle. I just signed up with a local group, and those people will take ANYTHING.
Jul '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Rob, I rarely disagree with you. But to suggest that Peeps are not absolutely indispensable for the maintenance of civilization is folly.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
I love this piece, Rob, and I can relate. I suffer from a mild case of pack rat disease. OK, maybe not so mild. But at least I won't be featured on Hoarders any time soon.
I have been on a mission this last month with the goal of throwing out or donating at least five items a day. So far so good. It feels good to do some Spring cleaning.
The strength of the American economy can be judged by how many industries making and selling completely unnecessary stuff are in existence. Like craft stores. When I was a kid, my mom would hang a few ears of Indian corn on the front door for the fall and an evergreen wreath for Christmas. Now suburban women drive weekly to enormous craft stores so they can constantly decorate their homes and yards with assorted seasonal "stuff." We can't just bake cakes; we need specialty cake pans shaped like bunnies and shamrocks and hearts.
I was called by a market research firm to participate in a group that explored why women have cut down on their plug-in air freshener pruchases........I blame it all on Obama.
Oct '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Rob... Please don't take this as gloating. I have never been a hoarder, or even a saver of stuff. For most of my early years of marriage I had to struggle to free my wife of keeping stuff not needed, even though she wasn't all that much of a saver of stuff.
Not to sound religious, God knows I'm not churchy, but I do believe in acting on your beliefs. One of mine is that if I don't hang on to stuff, and keep it moving on to others who might need it, God will always see to it that my actual needs will be met. It's been working that way for over 40 years now, and even though I've been broke occasionally, I have never been poor, nor thought of myself as such.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
I've made a couple rules for myself. One is, always park my cars in the garage. If you're parking a several thousand dollar car outside so that you can preserve a bunch of junk that's worth a few bits, there's something seriously going wrong. Two, if you rummage through old things and find something you didn't know you had, you can throw it away without pause. If you suddenly had a need for something and never conceived that you actually had it in your possession, then it's absolutely useless to keep it. (Hope you followed that)
I frequently walk or jog around my neighborhood and am always stunned when I see a huge house with a three-car garage where all three cars are parked in the driveway. I just don't get it.
Aug '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
I have a collection of over 1000 board games and I am gleeful that I have a storage unit where I can keep the games. I visit it about once a month to trade out games that my gaming group played in the previous month for games we will be playing. It's a nice system, though I do need to get a better system of organization. I need to get some shelves in that unit.
May '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Rob - If you have a few old Cheers scripts, sign them and auction them off for Japan Relief or one of your other favorite endeavors.
Some folks junk is another's treasure. Make it work!
May '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Mom has three storage lockers, an enormous house, and is on Social Security. My stuff now fits neatly into two small rooms. Including shelves for real books!
Sooooo, what are you planning to do when you ditch the iPad you bought because (gasp!) you can turn it upside down, but can't even play youtubes?
Apr '11
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
It being Easter, I don’t think anyone would mind me bringing up Jesus’ recommendation on what to do with your unneeded Stuff.
Here wonderfully discussed by an actually funny Canadian conservative cartoonist, Dave Sim, who came to God in middle age.
Being a Sufi almost by inclination I had no stuff to accumulate, but I remember talking to Dave on the phone once about his Supercool Penthouse Apartment in Downtown Kitchner Ontario, the caviar and Dom and getting a limo to anywhere he wanted to go and I just couldn’t hold it in, the laughter.
He was silent a long moment and then he broke out too.
“Okay, It is pretty ridiculous,” he said after the gales of laughter ended....
Edited on April 23, 2011 at 11:42pmNov '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Дитто фор тче боозе.
May '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
I'll take the free weights.
Jan '11
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Rob, I second the suggestion to donate scrips to a charity for auction. Also, your vinyl may be worth serious money to a collector. I do not agree w/ WSJ that booze is not essential: we're the parents of a toddler & a teen. :-)
Jan '11
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
StickerShock - me like what you say. The battle can be won or lost at your front door. The most wonderful feeling is to have a net exit of "stuff" from your house. Don't bring it in! :-)
May '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Shhh. You're still trying to get people to buy Ricochet memberships, Rob.
Dec '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
Make it a policy to move once every 5 years - it forces you to do a reevaluation of everything you own. We did a complete remodel of the downstairs of our house last summer, and the back of the SUV must have made about 50 trips to Goodwill. Next comes the upstairs...
Jul '10
Re: Why Do We Buy Stuff We Don't Need?
"I’ve rented a small storage space a kilometer or two from my house."
California has finally fallen into communism.