Gimmees and Playstation 3

I wrote this post a few days before Thanksgiving. It was supposed to be a follow up to another post from that week. But it took me a few days to get around to uploading the first post, and three weeks to get around to uploading the second.

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The wealth of this country is astounding. I wonder sometimes whether it's real or fabricated by government intervention into the economy. It is true that our tools and machines have increased our productivity and efficiency. But it's hard to know how much these things are responsible for our abundance, and how much of it is just "paper" wealth, like the riches of the late 1920s and the dot.com businesses of the 1990s. Rush says that the economy is not a zero-sum game. But I think it would be (at least, mostly) if we were still on the gold standard.

We're part of the working poor in this country. We've chosen that. When we read chapter 10 of Whatever Happened to Justice?, we recognized the concept of economic calculation: that people spend money only on things they want more than money. We would rather have time to read with the kids than money for a trip to Disneyworld. We would rather have a mom who cooks nutritious food from scratch than eat out often. We would rather have old cars and hand-me-down clothes than have a fancy tv. It's not that we don't want those other things: we just don't want them as much as we want the TIME to be with family.

That's why I am amazed by the society's captivation with new toys. There are new models of cars each year. We come up with VCRs, and then they're outdated by DVD players, which are no longer state-of-the-art because of TIVO and HDTV and who-knows-what-all-else. I can't find a pay-phone any more when I need one; they're no longer needed because of cell phones. Nice normal middle-class folks go to the casino and set a limit of $100/day to spend in the slots, when I'm feeling frivolous for spending $10/week to buy a roast annnd another whole $10/week for a turkey breast. I never understood the fights and the long lines for the Beanie Babies or the Cabbage Patch Dolls or the Tickle-Me Elmos.

But even those dolls, selling for $5-30 each, were nothing compared to the Playstation 3s. I can't even begin to fathom the desire to wait in line for 44 hours, in the cold, to be first in line at Best Buy when the new toy goes on sale. Do people really need these THINGS so badly that they can't wait until April to buy one when the bugs are worked out of it and the price isn't quite so outlandish? Neither can I fathom the wealth of a person who would pay $5000 (or even $25,000!) for a toy that will rot his brain.

I'm not saying that these toys shouldn't be allowed, or should be controled by govt, or anything of that sort. I also know that some very nice people really enjoy shopping (and getting some fantastic deals) on Black Friday every bit as much as I detest getting anywhere near town on the Friday after Thanksgiving. But no matter how you look at it, these things are evidences that we are a society that enjoys its indulgences and immediate gratification.

And this extends to so many other areas. We want our new toys NOW, for Christmas, and not next spring. We want the latest electronic gadgets. We want a pill or a drug that alleviates pain or germies within a few hours, rather than stopping our frenzied pace and sleeping off an illness. We're willing to let kids play it safe in front of the television and Game Boy (where they "won't get hurt") rather than letting them risk a broken arm climbing a tree or riding a bike without hands. That's because we can SEE the broken arm, but we can't see the damage done by the screen-time. We approve school referenda that ensure the kids have the latest lab equipment, the best theater and band opportunities, and the highest-quality sports fields and pools. We're willing to require pasteurization (which causes all sorts of allergies and obesity and other health problems) and irradiation and genetically-engineered food -- because we can't see immediate results of tinkering with our food, whereas we CAN see the few tragic results of infected spinach or milk.

Instant gratification, whether it's a Big Mac or a Playstation or one of a gazillion other examples -- it's NOT in the best long-term interest of either society or individuals. Nevertheless, instant gratification is one of the primary engines of our economy. How long will it be until our engine causes us to crash?