I went to the Illahee Lecture titled “Why We Buy” with Juliet Schur. Dr. Schur opened by humorously explaining her profession (once-economist, now sociologist): “We take the obvious and make it really really complicated.” The crowd chuckled, and she rolled into her presentation.

I won’t try to capture everything that she said in that cozy hour, but will present some of the highlights with some of my thoughts.

HIGHLIGHT: money and happiness.

There is a very weak link between money and happiness. They (social scientists, I assume) have measured happiness and have found that above an annual income of $20,000, people don’t get much happier. She stated a few reasons for this: higher levels of income are typically associated with lots of work and stress; consumerism fosters dissatisfaction; income growth erodes social factors.

THOUGHT: yup.

This message resonated deeply with me. I spent a few years living in Africa where, granted, compared to locals I was wealthy as a queen.  Compared to my situation in the States I was living with the bare basics (bamboo hut, no running water, no electricity). Here in Portland I’m not exactly flush with cash: I think twice about buying cheese and turning on the heat. My mantra, though, has consistently been, “Poor in habitation; rich in experience.” In Peace Corps and now, I feel like I have been the happiest I have ever been in life.

HIGHLIGHT: friends influence friends…even 3,000 miles away.

There is a strong link between obesity and social networks. Get this: your body mass index is directly influenced by your friends, whether they live here in Portland or across the country in Boston. They (the scientists) also see correlations between other behaviors such as smoking, drinking, exercise, purchases, etc.

THOUGHT: hmm. That explains the push ups, and the worms.

I can understand that there’s a correlation between friends’ behavior in the town you’re living in, but across the country? Wow. I guess that explains why my friend in Boston, Erin, called me when she started doing push-ups. We talk about twice a year, but she thought of me when she started doing push ups (don’t ask). Another friend in North Carolina (again, someone with whom I correspond maybe six times a year) posted on my facebook page that he was thinking about starting a worm bin. It’s kind of astonishing to think that we influence people thousands of miles away.

HIGHLIGHT (KIND OF): garments purchased, garments discarded.

They (again, “they” being these scientists I assume made the charts Dr. Schur showed the audience, sorry I didn’t get the reference details) track the average number of garments purchased in the United States per year. In 1991, it was 34. In 1996, it was 41. In 2002, the average consumer purchased 52 garments. That means the average consumer bought one thing to wear every week of the year (this number excludes pantyhose, socks, and underwear sales). We held steady in 2004 and 2006 at 54 garments per year.

This consumption translates directly into the United States’ exports of used apparel. In 1991 we exported 150 million kilograms of used apparel. In 1996, 225 million tones. In 2002, 375 million tons. In 2004, the United States topped 500 million tons of garment exports. Oh. My. Goodness.  Just think of all that fuel, shipping our clothing around the world again and again!

THOUGHT: get naked.

Well, not really. Okay, maybe. No. Wait. Don’t get naked; it is cold and rainy outside. Two thoughts about the whole garment purchase/export thing: First, the clothing market that I went to in Africa was called the “Dead Man’s Clothing Market”. They could not imagine that anyone would have so many clothes that they would give them away. I look at my closet hangers and shelves, now laden with apparel built up over the past few years, with some guilt. Ugh. It is altogether too easy to accumulate stuff! Second thought: have you heard of naked lady parties? You get a bunch of friends together to swap clothes. It’s great. Your clothes get another chance, or they get donated (eek… and then maybe shipped to Africa). But at least you are less inclined to buy more new garments (52 a year?!) By the way, no, folks rarely get totally naked. And yes, I have heard of co-ed naked lady parties (read: clothing swaps), too.

The Illahee audience (mostly Portlanders, and lots of bikers judging from the abundance of bikes on the sidewalk) was funny: folks actually cheered when Peter Schoonmaker announced that retail sales are down 28% in Oregon for 2008 (I think that’s what he said). Where else would people cheer low sales? I love it.

Re-tale retail, told,
Bye bye, buy,

Meredith