Are We Materialistic?
By Briana, age 17, Pennsylvania
iPods, cell phones, expensive clothes, fancy cars, Starbucks, laptops, and tons of jewelry ...
So the subject has come up that our generation is SUPER materialistic. I do agree with this theory, and I think it does have a huge effect on our economy. If you think about it, the amount of expensive things kids our age buy is probably what's holding up our economy at this point. The amount of money we spend in the clothing and electronics industries is insane! If all of that went away - all the money that is being transferred from teenage consumers to companies - there would be many stores that would go bankrupt (such as American Eagle, Abercrombie, and Hollister, stores whose main audience is teens).
I feel that kids these days don't realize how much they really have. Most of us don't even think twice about spending 25 dollars on a t-shirt that probably cost 4 dollars to make. 25 dollars to us is like 200 dollars to teens in the 1950s (due to inflation over the years).
Kids between the ages of 12 and 19 can't live without their iPods, Abercrombie hoodies, and Coach handbags. It really makes you wonder what we would do without big sunglasses, a cell phone attached to our ear (or thumbs), and Starbucks Coffee. What would we do without technology? It would really interest me to see an experiment with teens not having everything "cool."
In my opinion, I think we, the materialistic generation, are meant to be materialistic, and that's ok, as long as we're not spoiled and ungrateful. We all need to realize that we are very lucky to have what we do, and we should appreciate that. There are so many people in the world who don't even have shoes on their feet, and we complain that ours have to be Prada, or we'll go barefoot. I think that as long as we understand the cost of things and make sure we (or mostly our parents!) don't go broke, we can be materialistic ... to a point. (lol)