Where did all the money go?

 

You work for years toiling for a paycheck every Friday to pay the bills, buy some food, and get your kids clothing and at the end of it all, where did all the money go?

We live in a capitalistic society where we make things that people buy and then throw away to buy more things we make. Consumerism is in our blood and we must have more.

Peer pressure to be as good or better than the Jones starts early. What brand of shoes are those? Where do you live? What do you drive? Where do your kids go to school?

There is the constant motivation to buy more and buy the latest to keep up. Advertising convinced you to throw away that old refrigerator for the latest and greatest model. The same was true with automobiles, cigarettes, fashion and technology has made it worse. The same with most every product you fill your house with.

Look around.

Does that phone in your hand any better than you last phone? Does it ring? Can you talk in it? Does it text better? Still you had to have it.

There are not as many Yard Sales in this neighborhood but the online Marketplace shows us what we clutter our lives with.

Seems we have way too many bicycles. Like children’s clothing, the kids outgrow their bikes and unless you can pass them on to the next brood, it is sent to Goodwill or put online to try and reap some of the original cost.

Autos seem to be frequent post in the Marketplace. Someone bought a mobile machine and ran it until the maintenance was more trouble than it was worth so posts it online and maybe someone else can make it run a little longer. It is better than the scrape yard or rusting on the side of the road.

Electronics.

Seems everything that isn’t plastic (and some that are) run on electricity. Lamps, hair dryers, curling irons and a myriad of items that are must have at the time of purchase only to be replaced or put in a drawer and forgotten.

Take a look in the kitchen. All the appliances that make our life easier come with a cost. Most of what fills your cabinets and countertops are not the first version for some inviting ad showed you a better way to cook a chicken or carve a roast or brew a cup of coffee and you bought it. Don’t check the drawers for all the spoons, ladles, strainers and assorted tools of culinary mischief one can buy and only use once.

Check out your garage.

How many screwdrivers do you need? How many hammers are enough? Was that your first lawnmower? Even if you are not a handyman or mechanic there will be drawers of tools that were necessary at the time or looked keen when going through the hardware toy store. These will most likely wind up in a landfill than a yard sale because everyone has them and your kids don’t want them for they have the new ones.

Entertainment certainly has cost us. The little 8” B&W TV has turned into a home entertainment center with surround sound, a screen the size of the Paramount Theater and speakers that cost as much as autos to give you that sound only movies can provide. Entertainment migrated from the simple vinyl record player to the digital world and along the way we replaced every component with the latest and greatest version of what we heard on our 3” car speaker. Who wants an 8-track player?

What about all this other stuff?

There are campers, trailer, sheds, lumber, boats, musical gear and even underwear.

Want to know where all the money goes?

How many shower curtains have you bought? How many sheets? How many pajamas? How many socks? How many tires? How many microwaves? How many cameras? How many razors? How many combs?

The list goes on and on until you realize, that’s life. We purchase items that are disposable (either by necessity or whim) and if we can recoup some of the cost, we post it online hoping one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

Do we ever consider the value of the item or it’s lifetime when we add to our cart? After the usefulness of this item we have selected and used for our enjoyment, could it be repurposed for another use?

It doesn’t matter to you. You have already spent the money, but the item maybe of value to another?

I know where my money went. I see some of it every day. I also have accounts of wasteful decisions and treasured purchases. Many items are no longer within reach but the memory of the finding and retrieving another’s creation to enjoy and possibly learn from was worth the price.

When they drop you in the ground, you won’t be worth a plug nickel so it doesn’t matter.

Except to those who must dispose of it.